“An April Day” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow  

When the warm sun, that brings
Seed-time and harvest, has returned again,
‘T is sweet to visit the still wood, where springs
The first flower of the plain.   

I love the season well,
When forest glades are teeming with bright forms,
Nor dark and many-folded clouds foretell
The coming-on of storms.   

From the earth’s loosened mould
The sapling draws its sustenance, and thrives;
Though stricken to the heart with winter’s cold,
The drooping tree revives.   

The softly-warbled song
Comes from the pleasant woods, and colored wings
Glance quick in the bright sun, that moves along
The forest openings.   

When the bright sunset fills
The silver woods with light, the green slope throws
Its shadows in the hollows of the hills,
And wide the upland glows.   

And when the eve is born,
In the blue lake the sky, o’er-reaching far,
Is hollowed out and the moon dips her horn,
And twinkles many a star.   

Inverted in the tide
Stand the gray rocks, and trembling shadows throw,
And the fair trees look over, side by side,
And see themselves below.   

Sweet April! many a thought
Is wedded unto thee, as hearts are wed;
Nor shall they fail, till, to its autumn brought,
Life’s golden fruit is shed.   

My attention was drawn to this beautiful verse this morning:   

‘T is sweet to visit the still wood, where springs
The first flower of the plain.   

The “still wood,” Longfellow writes, “where springs the first flower of the plain.”  How well do you know the still wood, metaphorically speaking, in your heart and mind?  “Where springs the first flower” – the birth of a new idea, a fresh thought, a spark of genius – “of the plain,” that is, into the unformed future before you.   

The future is shaped by the choices we make, the words we speak and the actions we perform.  Far too often the future is born of the ramblings of the madding crowd and not of stillness.  Stillness is reserved in the minds of many to some afterlife.  “Rest in peace,” the saying goes, but how little is penned about living in peace.   

Milton’s verse in Paradise Lost: “the madding wheels/Of brazen chariots raged” describes the experience of life of many in our modern era.  Raging chariots – no rest for the weary – unrelenting pressure to achieve eventually wear on even the strongest of men and women.  Why is stillness so out of vogue?   

It can be a challenge to find stillness yet it is always available.  It can be restored through breath, through prayer, through complete surrender or total concentration in an activity you love.  Stillness is a sacred place from which newness is born through you.    

Have a wonderful weekend!