A smile creeps across my lips and I wonder why. Then I remember where I am; why I’m singing over that battling roar of the river, and soaking up the sun.


I’m where every human should be. I’m at the mercy of the animals and of the elements. I’m praying for their happiness instead of my own. Each passing cloud simply becomes, not a murderous pileup of violet, threatening a storm, but just another memory floating nonchalantly through the recesses of my mind. Every fear of mine is washed away in the urgency of the river.

I’m where everyone should want to be, held captive by the majesty of the broken wilderness. Browning trees welcoming me with weak voices, their trunks losing strength with each heave of their breath. They invite me to take part in their reconstruction; invited to become yet another soul who has so lovingly given into the beauty and warmth of the natural world. I sing lullabies and loves songs to the saplings as they take on the power of the mountains… the power of our world.

I feel the way every human ought to feel; connected to the world in the most primal way. The harmony between me and the fly on my paper, or the birds above my head. I cannot imagine myself in any other place than dancing with the blades of grass and singing to the river. He sings back in deep roaring gurgles, reminding me that I’m alive. The chirps and buzzes telling me that this is paradise, right here.

Each buzz is a shout from the past, of love and affection. Each mosquito is another being, another heart that's beating. The ferns ask for me to join their world, where love exists in the ground where fallen leaves rest, and the leaves of those who still have time. The air swells with fits of laughter, swirling around you with the wind. This world beckons me, like the tide to the moon, asking for me to become a part of everything that matters.

How I would love to live in this little haven, where I am no more intelligent or important than the being next to me. Where the trees speak and the river sings me to sleep. Where the silence brings acceptance, the sounds that only the forest gets to hear. Where the night brings exhaustion and the dawn renewal. And the wind sends whispery messages through the trees.

How I would love to forget a world outside of my own, where there aren’t trees, and the song of the birds is drowned out by the song of impatient drivers. But alas, that is where I belong.

I belong free from the grips of the roots of the pines as they tie me to the soil. Free from hopping rivers with singing birds. Free from playing with the pinecones littering the rich forest floor.

I belong in the world of beautiful arrogance turned to peace, in the every changing pulse of a community of intelligence. I belong in the world that remains wonderfully afraid of what lies beyond the sea of concrete and the horizon of buildings. I belong spending a lifetime seeking the people who see through the resorts and into the world that blossoms creativity and breeds beauty. I belong dreaming of dancing along the peaks of the Rocky Mountains from my bedroom window. Able to touch the glass of the car but never be feel the world that I wish I was my own.

I belong imprisoned in a world of silence, with the deadly secret of the forest that sings.