We were staying in a cabin in a forest. I was with my friend who knows me longer than any other. Our friendship is at that highest level in which the thinnest of armor or protection was too cumbersome and too unnecessary.We’d spent the night in conversation from the lightest to the heaviest, from the brightest to the dimmest, and we’d ventured to the edges of the known world dreaming up ways to fix what ‘s in it. Our best answer had involved the distillation of a better cognac, the proofing of a finer vodka, and the rearing of people who were far more generous.
She’s shorter and an organized thinker. So, she found her way to the feather bed, when I found my way to my journal and another glass of a Sauvignon Blanc I particularly like. I wrote a while until that hour was upon me. It’s the time when the world seems fooled -- that night might stand still to give us all the time we need to have our thoughts leisurely.
I walked out to the patio, thinking I might do that. Yet sitting with my glass of wine, I found the forest made me think of myself as the tree that falls with no sound when no one is there to hear. So rather than fight that feeling I took a walk to join the trees. I headed toward the water with my "long way to morning" thoughts.
Just before sunrise, that sunrise, every sunrise, I am like that soundless tree. No one knows me. No one sees me. I don’t need a name, a number or place where I must settle. I can be anyone. I have the luxury of time. I am soundless and alive. It’s free to set aside connections, to walk alone without realities, to drop off the definitions my life has drawn. I wonder if the tree knows that. I wonder if the sky and water understand the stillness of the time.
I sit in darkness by the water. It’s wealth to think I am no one. I’ve no place to be but where I am, no stress to feel but the faint breeze and anticipation of a sunrise. The sun seems to set the tempo. I takes it’s time, a slow red glow growing on the water. I’m walking with the sunrise beside me.
I sing a song from childhood.
No one can hear me, but yes I am.
−me strauss Letting me be
4 comments:
What a beautiful post, Liz. I relate so deeply to what you say about just before sunrise: no one knows me or sees me, I don't need anything to define me and I can be anyone - I AM anyone. It's my favorite and best time of day. It carries me through the rest of the day. It's when I feel most free and most my true self.
I am reminded of one of my favorite Rumi quotes:
The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. You must ask for what you really want.
Thanks, Liz.
Dawn,
Reading your cmment took me back to that time of day again. How well you describe, you were able to transport me. Thank you for doing that. I got to be there twice today.
sorry, i must echo dawn's comment.
what a beautiful post!
how did you come out with this :"I am like that soundless tree. "? really describes the mood of this post, contemplative and calm.
everyone needs some solitude sometimes, i guess. i wrote about this recently, but you wrote it really beautifully. mine's sounds a bit pessimistic. :)
Dsnake
you know better than to compare your writing with another's. I am calm in my spirit these days and feeling peace. I'm must show, must be there, because I work to write authentically. Only my own voice on this part of the Internet -- that's my rule for writing here.
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