The Sound of Creation

Nature sustains me. Nature is what I know, and the Wild sings me her

song. The aural landscape that brings me peace also reminds me of the stability of my known world. All is as it is. Life is unfolding as it should. I sit outside in morning’s low-sun coolness, sipping my mushroom elixir. Surrounding me, enveloping me in a soft, sonorous hug are the sounds that mean “home” in my domain:  the soft babble of the fountain, the low calls of vireos, doves, wrens as they perch to drink. A neighbor’s horse whinnies as, in the not-far distance, my hens proclaim with pride that another egg has been laid: “Hah! Work’s done .... time for breakfast and a ground-scratch!” The stillness is full of the sounds of contentment—that is, the simple sounds of living. I may ascribe them meaning, but they’re simply the symphony of ordinary life-right-now around me.

Ah ... there's the dove! I think they're building a nest again in our old dying pine.  The glorious tree is beetle-ravaged, its needles less lustrous each year, but still the doves come, the young fledge among its soft green needles. I hear its branches sing. 

I wonder ... If I lived in a high-rise in New York City, what would be my sounds of contemplation?  Perhaps, (from long distant memories) it might be the hum of traffic, the sounds of voices and chatter, a siren now and then, the breeze; human sounds of aliveness with an occasional natural call squeezing its way into the aural landscape.  But if my mind were adjusted, accepting (as I sat on a little balcony with a cityscape view), that too might serve as a lovely, peaceful and even meditative day’s beginning.

What are the sounds of contemplation? How important is the aural landscape in a context of silence and sound? What brings me closer to my quiet, deeper God-Within?  Is it the quality and nature of the sounds, or is it the consciousness I bring to them? Perhaps the simple recognition of my essential sonorous surroundings is what really matters.  What are the “sounds of silence” that bring peace, settle me into my body, expand my chest into a deep, calm breath and relax into my open, soft belly?  As my mind lets go of its grip on "having purpose" and “making sense,” how do I feel in my body?

The Christian desert fathers and mothers, Muslim mystics, Hindu yogis and Buddhist practitioners all teach of sonorous surroundings as tools for contemplation. More recently, desert hermits who live here in the Arizona desert write just as compellingly as the sages of the past:  

You do not have to experience the geographical desert.  Whether you live in San Francisco or the Sahara, Moscow or the Mohave, Saigon or the Sonoran, the call of the desert is the same.  God speaks to the intimate depths of every human heart through the prophet Hosea: “I will lead you into the desert, and there I will speak to your heart.” (Hosea 2:14).  — Tessa Bielecki 2016

Heart of Sand

Sometimes on the mesa between the wall
of Christ’s Blood Mountains and the tower of Pedernal;

Sometimes walking the vaulted memory halls
of the House of Islam I stopped.  I heard a call:

Swirling down from a dome it fell on the ear of my heart
like silent thunder or singing rain.  What art

can sing down storms on song-starved listening land,
can rain a song to slake a heart of sand?
—Father Dave Denny  2010

The practice of fleeing to the desert—to the harsh, simple, austere environments that demanded presence and attention while encouraging the inward journey—was the stuff of hermits, seers and mystics.  I can't presume to travel that same path, and yet their writings inspire, their practices entice. Their mystery has always beckoned me.  And, I know a few—all are deeply joyous, open, mystical, wise. Perhaps it is their “stillness within” that makes them such good listeners.

Is silence really silent? Or is it filled with soft sounds of "Just This" unfolding in its hourly, daily, seasonal rhythms, reminding me to seek my own sure paces that, unseen, make predictable and dependable the balance between hummingbird busyness and the cycles of life.

Shhh ... Four kinds of birds just landed in my tree. They are looking at each other.  And now a burly bee bumbles past. No, it's a hummingbird! It lights on a low-hanging branch and stares at me, dives at my bright robe then darts away disappointed. "Go find a flower... I've planted them for you!"

Hmmm. Am I just a scurrying water strider, skating on the surface? Is this an invitation to go deeper? A reminding moment? It is up to me—not to my mind but to my own still center—to drop down, stay present, be grateful for the shared sounds of creaturehood in life's brief journey, with the invitation to be, always, more alive. 

Yes! I'll take it! If it brings me to a peaceful place, then that’s enough!  

And now, my day begins.  Activity stands on a small but firm foundation of soundful contemplation. One day at a time, the sounds ... not only of silence, but of life … are my sustenance, companions, teachers, all of them holding the promise that there is more.

Listen ... can you hear Creation singing?

Rita Cantu
June 5, 2023