. . . if we surrendered
to earth’s intelligence
we could rise up rooted, like trees.

Instead we entangle ourselves
in knots of our own making
and struggle, lonely and confused.

So, like children, we begin again
to learn from the things,
because they are in God’s heart;
they have never left him.

This is what the things can teach us:
to fall,
patiently to trust our heaviness.
Even a bird has to do that
before he can fly.

-Rainer Maria Rilke from Book of Hours: Love Poems to God

I traveled into the mountains this morning, and walked along the edge of Madera Creek. The creek was dry, or so I imagined, when I began my descent at 5,000 feet. But by the time I had walked a half mile, I noticed damp Sycamore leaves, recently shed from the overhanging trees and dropped into the creek bed.

Another hundred yards and the creek pooled in deeper crevices. Dark and bubbly, it followed a circuitous route as it descended the mountain.

I watched the water swirling around large piles of leaves. Single leaves danced along, bobbing on the water’s surface. I listened to the creek’s song, low and splashing, accompanied by an occasional bird’s song.

The sounds of life, the language of nature.

As Rilke wrote, “if we surrendered to earth’s intelligence, we could rise up rooted, like trees.”

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She continues to explore some of her favorite places and read some of her favorite poets.