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After Midnight Blogger: The Nothing Left to Say Edition

Posted by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Deputy Managing Editor, Columnist in Health, Society.
Mar 26th, 2009 | View Comments

THE CSENDES EMBER

We were climbing up past Maroon Bells
It was getting to be a straight up climb.
Needing breath, we stopped talking…
Ran out of words even more than running out of breath.
Something about being in the Csendes ember of Nature
Makes small talk stupider than usual…
Csendes ember, amongst my Magyar tribal people
means, Man of Silence, the name for any mountain
anywhere, human or rock.

Running out of words…
Sometimes it’s all been said anyway, hasn’t it?
And even the good parts
Have been said and said.

And there comes then, mountain’s majesty…
Shhhhhh,
He is speaking now
Didn’t you think the Majesty,
The Csendes ember, man of so few words,
Would have the biggest voice
Booming,
Thundering even?

And what is it instead?
Csendes ember’s voice
Up here in the steaming fog near the top of the mountain
Where literally we stand inside a cloud on this mountain?

Mountain Majesty’s voice
Is that of a little bird
That is somewhere flying and twittering
And whistling and making that sound
Like cicadas make… somewhere between a buzz
And a cry.
Csendes ember’s voice is a tiny bird
above timberline,
And like the Source without source,
We cannot see Who is singing
But we can hear Her…
once we run out of words
And just climb,
Just climb in silence made holy
By having finally
run out of words.
__________________________

CODA: Para Tomás Fox

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Ghostdreams

When I was a little kid we lived under Mt. Diablo in Danville, Ca.
I remember the first time we drove up to the top of the mountain, being aware of this great "silence" that descended (not just around me but inside me as well). It was an amazing encounter and sadly, I've not thought about it for many, many years.
I loved it up there and later, in my early twenties, I would hike up there just to sit and "be quiet."
Thank you for the reminder!
Ghosty

river

dear Dr. E. . .this is an awesome poem. . .With all that has been happening in the World, with all it contractions, the last several months. . .all the trying to figure it out. . .trying to fix it. . .trying to get back what was lost. . .trying to create it again. . . silence is such sanity. . . this poem has space and expansion. . . . The photo is really great also. . .

spirasol

I thought I heard that melody
and ran to the window.
Nothing there and so returned
to the conversation at hand,
my incessant babble.
but what it was, what it was
was an old inward tape,
an old memory
of being alone
and silent
now pleasantly triggered
by this poem
which begins in chatter
and settles down to
silence sitting in the snow
Here we could freeze
or die or just rest
in the majesty
but no words, no words

Thank you Archangel

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