There is a place where I like to go - it is always changing though never changes. You never see the same thing, feel the same thing, hear the same thing. Every time I walk beneath the trees, scramble and slide down the bank - watch the light dance through the branches and tickle the leaves… the noise of the world dims. A new sound emerges, slowly - teasingly - tenacious and unrelenting. If you let it.

Silence.

Silence. It is always there. The sound of it. The feel of it. The weight of it. The knowingness of it. But only if you know how to hear.

This place, this silence - holds one of my favorite, secret places.

But silence - what is it, really? I think it is myriad of things. It is not merely the absence of sound - that is simply a shallow awareness. It is not merely a quietness or a quieting… that is only sound turned low. Maybe it is all the sounds, muffled - held back. What if silence bears all the things we have carried - and have let go. That would make it heavy, no? Silence holds so much, but never bends. It tells you so much - but never utters a sound. Silence bears no colour - it is every colour.

Yet when you walk amongst and bear its weight, you begin to know that silence has a motion, a certain pressure to it. A physical - yet invisible presence glides over you like water. But yet the movement of silence enveloping you is only the acceptance of stillness. And once you surrender and immerse yourself within the stillness - you begin to feel the sound.

Stillness speaks.

The sound of silence. The sound has the strength of silk, the smoothness of metal, the hardness of stone and the bite of whiskey. Yet is tender and forgiving, a kiss after a quarrel. The voice of silence is everything, and nothing. You only begin to hear it after hours of wandering through it. The sound is soft - yet the strength behind it belies its delicate whisper through the leaves. Silence allows you to run your fingertips over the torn edges, the broken places - the holes. Stillness allows you to relive and touch all the small moments that seemed inconsequential but which had settled into your heart as magic.

When Silence speaks, listen. For silence can heal the beatings and bruising of sound

Silence is magic.