The trail below Nakusp frequently does haunt my mind.
It is a spring morning,
Hushed.
We are walking the trail, lined
With bright flowers, watching
Rivers of morning light
Rippling down the valleys,
Savouring a light breeze
Wrinkling the surface of the lake
Like gold foil in the sun.
Save for our own cathedral whisperings
There is only silence;
No rustling leaves, nor singing birds,
No purling brooks, no splash of trout.
There is the silence of the absence of movement:
Mountain peaks, snow still,
Dark, velvety, soundless trees,
And sunshine on the blooming flowers.
And the silence of movement:
The quiet undulation of tall grass,
The sun-clouds dappling the trees,
The stillness of the soaring eagle,
And the noiseless, distant, mountain mist.
It is a holy expansive stillness
Nature’s brooding calm.
It is Eden,
With divinity breathing quietude
In the cool of the morning.
All is peace and calm and revelation
As if creation had only just begun.
Lloyd Brown
St. John’s, Newfoundland