Tuesday 2 June 2020

Touching


Nowadays you can't walk into the woods without touching and being touched.


The uncurling ferns, the long, laden grasses, the leafing green boughs of young trees: nature cannot resist reaching out and making contact. In open places, spiderwebs span the distances, making themselves known in the early light.


The fragrance of the wild places is not distant or ineffable. It's here, now, within arm's reach, in the forest and in backyards everywhere.

 

All the roads I've ever travelled have led me to this time and this place. How far must I go to truly arrive where I am? Not far, I think. Not far at all.

 

Some days, even the sky feels so near I could reach up and touch it.


And what would it feel like, I wonder? Would the texture of sky be rough, billowed, rippling under my hand? Or would it lie smooth as glass beneath my fingers?



If you tilt your head just right, there are bits of sky in everything.


Even in the low places of life, improbable heights can be glimpsed.


Close enough to touch. Close enough to fall into. Close enough to swim for days in the cloudless blue depths.

  

When all the obstructions vanish, when the blue true dream of sky and the deep healing waters of the earth are one, that's when you know you're in touch with the world.


When heaven and earth are one, there's no need to go elsewhere, to reach farther, to grasp after what we don't have. Because it's all right here. Under our fingertips.

2 comments:

  1. Dylan,
    Hope you are doing well.
    Your photos are inspiring.
    Great images!
    Wishing we could visit.
    Alfred

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    Replies
    1. Thanks, Alfred. Yes, I'll look forward to seeing you up here again!

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