I ATTENDED a funeral yesterday. And in saying goodbye to David—a good, kind, and gentle man, who always elevated those around him—I thought again of how our lives are so much more than we know. Of how all things are more than we know—intertwined with one another, hinting at depths we seldom explore or understand. But sometimes, perhaps in the faces and words of loved ones and friends—expressing grief, admiration, and love, telling stories and sharing feelings, we are granted a glimpse of that greater Life.

Today in the forest at the Church O’ The Pines, the Deacon trees reach for the sky as they always do. The Chickadees have begun to sing their lovely mating song—which sounds to me so much like ‘Spring’s here!’ (They are our eternal optimists.) The Nuthatches mutter confidingly and Sparky the Cardinal flashes brightly through the pine boughs. And here, too, that greater life—the life that is more than we know—is expressed in countless ways. Longfellow said, ‘All things are symbols, the external shows of Nature have their image in the mind.’ And in the sweet voice of the Chickadee, we hear that mystic echo.

I recently wrote a statement of belief, that came more through me than from me. And in saying farewell to a friend, in driving across the wooded hills of Wisconsin and through its limestone parapets, in arriving home to our pines and woodland friends, it seemed affirmed in many ways. It is good to remember that in the journey of daily life—its often mundane problems and struggles and small irritations—there is something much larger going on. We are more than we know—to those who love us and share our lives, to all the world around us with which we are intertwined. We belong and we are connected—to daffodils and pasqueflowers, to stars and galaxies. To a little riverside forest, or any neighborhood we call home. From here at our humble Church O The Pines, all wish you good sabbath…

(This poster available at https://douglaswood.com//I-believe-in-poem-tree/ and all my books are at www.douglaswood.com)