It’s the quiet you first notice.
A pristine stillness, so quiet you can hear your own soul.
Which is kind of the whole point.
Here we find the sacred,
not really in nature
as in ourselves,
like a faint homing signal
bringing one back on course.
True, one can find the sacred in the city, as well—
Mother Teresa found it among the dying and dispossessed of Bombay—
but it’s generally more difficult for those of us who are not Mother Teresa.
Here amid the stillness
comes a quiet joy,
a contentment complete.
And a sublime relief,
of the navigator regaining the lost signal
showing him the way home.
[Biographical note: During the years in southern California (1970-76), the Sierra Nevada were my sanctuary and my sanity, and I made as many trips into them as I could. Perhaps ironic: Attending seminary and serving a church, it was the mountains where I went seeking my own spiritual source and salvation. Yet I am far from the first to sense and seek the holy in the mountains, far from the teeming city. “I lift up mine eyes to the mountains,” proclaimed the Psalmist. “From whence comes my help? My help comes from the Lord (the Source), who made Heaven and Earth.”]
[First posted: June 9, 2019]
