Bird Song

Hermitage- Early Morning

The woods outside the hermitage are not silent. Two nights ago an owl hoo-hu-hoo hooo-hooo-ed immediately outside the sleeping loft window at 2am. For quite some time.
Somewhat more pretty and more haunting than a car alarm which I had been accustomed to in Calgary. But no less loud.
So what's the difference?
Today the sun gazes its long arm through the brush and trees. Gazes at me through the window.
And from this light I see hummingbirds (zzz-zzz) flittering from little pink flowers. The high pitched alarm (chip-chip-chip-chip-chip) of one bird calls loud two trees away. Shortly after other chip-chip's away. Noisy little woods.
But I realise that the reason why the birds make their calls- even next to and on top of each other is that dropped beneath it a field of stillness reverberates in all directions. The silence of the woods.
Because of this the birds can hear each other. Without that background quiet the birds would not call because they could not hear each other.
Unlike in the city with its constant strain of bodies and machines.
Perhaps that is why the birds leave or give up their singing.

Its been a week and a half since sesshin- that intense back breaking week of silent meditation which which we all scramble while remaining upright.
It takes time to recover from the work of no work.
Time to readjust the mental landscape.
Here among the trees I hear myself again because the background chatter is gone.
The city of fear, anger, delusion is miles away.
Instead there is just the softness of a mind abandoning its own terrorism.
Soft enough to hold a field of stillness. Where finally I can hear my own voice.