There are two silences. One silence I choose to keep when I need to hear a word that will heal, instruct, or console. The other silence comes when I have heard something so powerful, so real, that words, spoken or written, would only diminish its power.
Uncle explained that the pines and oaks will not spread into the fields to grow and make a new woods, unless we leave the ground unseeded. My uncle envisioned that this barren land was to become a new forest, one of great beauty and repose. "To be poor and be without trees, is to be the most starved human being in the world. To be poor and have trees, is to be completely rich in ways that money can never buy."