I hunt silence

I hunt silence, face solitude
in wide wild spaces,

where the wind roars down the mountains,
and the rain lashes the windows.

I found this place by drawing a house,
two windows with a front door between them
and moved in.

I settle into quietness
and feel the shape of each day,
when silence takes hold
of my senses;

then my hearing feels honed
and I separate noises of wind
by volume and strength,

become aware of colour and sound,
unlike before
open my mind to joy and tears.

I ban the ticking clock,
but slowly the ghosts of time
are shifting reality.

I respond with meditation,
a prayer and long walks.
No need for guests,
the phone,
radio, computer,
the door bell.

I keep on searching for silence
like the one between mother and baby
at the end of a night feed,
or two lovers embracing
without need or demand.

That is where the landscape of silence takes shape,
in high grasslands,
with views across fields and an unbroken line
where earth meets sky.

Now I live
with the sound of a stream in the background
and a far away craw from a crow.

I am thriving on sun and clouds,
as they alternate and shift colour,
and the way heather and grasses move in the wind.

I sit up in a morning of happiness,
no one coming and me going nowhere.

I wonder how I arrived here
in the sunshine, at my doorstep,
where I listen to silence.

I will paint myself a garden,
with a view across the sea,
draw foxes, a deer,
the first swallows
and the moment the sky turns to gold.

I will sit out at night under the stillness of stars,
so that the silence can work in me
and I will know about healing.