Have you ever closed your eyes and listened to the symphony?
Can you tune out some sounds to hear others?
I do this often with the sounds of cars, of television, of construction.
Can you mute out the shouts?
Can you click the remote and shut it all off?
Can you tune out the static of man?
If you can then you understand my kind of symphony.
I walk down the wooded trail then slide in between two rhododendrons then follow a tiny creek bed up a incline and stop at a clear pool underneath a waterfall.
Now I sit and take off my socks and my hiking boots and sit down Indian style on the soft green grass and tilt my head up toward the sky. I close my eyes and wait until I can hear my own breath.
I smile opening my eyes and say "Maestro please!"
The first to brave an octave is the mighty waterfall that sings acappella. Next comes the lone woodpecker. He mans the percussion part of the orchestra. Next a whipporwill sings in absoloute pitch as the water changes melody to a cantata of the wind whistled through the Poplar leaves and shaking into slight rustle through the lone Weeping Willow tree that hugs the river bank.
A hummingbird enters for his solo humming around the flowers as the bees now join in accompaniment. It is so soft with the lapping of the water onto the pebbles of the tiny pool that the acoustics are wondrous.
The sky starts to turn gray and the full orchestra now commences as a storm adds to the fugue with cymbals crashing in thunder and the resonance of pelting rain.
A owl cries out in a haunting reedy cacophony as other tiny nocturnal creatures scurry shifting leaves or burrowing into dens and nests. Strange movements surround me from the air currents that change and shift and sing through the branches and lift up the leaves into a mighty swoosh.
The rain ends in an aria of a sparrow and chirip of a cardinal arietta.
I smile up as the dancing fireflies enter with the just the hint of a sound. One lands on my hand glowing bright then off bright then off as the stringed group of crickets strike their bows and play masterfully resonating with the waterfall's thunder as a deer cracks twigs hopping closer to sip at the brook.
I watch the doe leave as a squirrel chatters looking down at me from an old Oak Tree. Acorns fall in slow pitters and then the wood pecker taps his percussion as the soft cello and violins playing on the mist above the water echo and bounce off the water and rocks in absolute music.
The deer scampers tiny hoofed beats as the Squirrel jitters the branches diving to another tree top. The fireflies stop and dig back into the earth. The leaves slowly grow still and all that is left is the mighty water standing on stage.
"Bravo!" I say clapping then put back on my socks and boots and wave good bye.