The Art Of Not Speaking
Breathing ceases, the slow audit of unfrozen trees …
10,000 years, forest to man:
Bestowed
An ability to be unable to freeze
Fearlessness
permeates the northern breeze.
Squirrels drunk on sap extract screaming truths
Acceptance, appreciation, breathless still,
learning to listen as the lone caribou
Consuming to learn, reflections earn
Bush virtues
As generations undisturbed,
outsiders undeterred.
Alone, an arrival of self, the spruce fire cracks
just enough
to warm hands, soothe spirits, impart northern wealth
November’s the eleventh name to appear
nearing what’s now known simply as winter
Winisk ice flows freely
A revolution per year
Freeze-up alters time
Ask an elder nothing specific
they’ll tell you what you need to hear
They say the bush, not the forest. Both
made of trees
Avoid becoming bewildered.
Slow down as the spirits,
the regeneration of leaves,
Balance
and truth speaks.
A willingness to listen; the art of not speaking,
filling space, or polluting air
An art far beyond the bush, this place.
A depth deeper than hearing
The appearance of free flowing ice is not real though
confined by river banks,
themselves
they began an upriver flow
The effects of sunsets and a drawn-out solemn stare.
What’s moving, what’s still?
There is a stillness in the movement,
an ever-imperceptible movement in being still
Even from upon the Eagle’s ledge, the rocks
unmoved for centuries
according to outside assessments
begin to move
against the current
Just slightly less than
Only just enough to let the grey owl know there is a spirit in everything
perceived through the eyes of acceptance and the gift of listening.
By Brandon MacLeod