I stepped onto the front porch and felt like someone was watching me. Sure enough, there on the wall by the screen door was a walking stick, a twig like insect with eyes perched on stalks. He was following my every move.  

Next I heard a buzzing noise, as a hummingbird swooped near me, attracted by my bright pink shirt. He hovered for a bit and then zoomed away, perhaps realizing I was not a big flower after all.  

Bluebirds dunked themselves in the bird bath, while a symphony of cheeps came from the shrubs, where cardinals awaited their turn. A vivid splash of orange flickered over the blueberry bushes, as another butterfly made its debut. Rhythmic clucking sounds signaled the start of chipmunk mating season.  

All this in my front yard on an ordinary day in September, when silence lay thick upon the terrain. There was a blissful absence of the grumbling lawn mowers and leaf blowers. I’ve waded in the ocean before and have surrendered to the icy currents of springs. But today I swam in a still pool of silence and peace.  

In my yard where roses turn their faces skyward and baby tomatoes slowly ripen, there is a palpable sense of God’s generosity. Caryll Houselander wrote: “One has so intensely the sense of all nature, taken as a whole—sky, earth, blossom, stars and sun and moon and rain and dew—being a thin veil on the eternal light, or a faint pulse of everlasting light.”  

Reason restricts us sometimes from seeing what is in front of us. It is the imagination that unlocks a world of possibilities, as children know well. Fairy tales feature talking bears and frogs turning into princes. Stuffed animals whisper comforting words to children in the dark.  

In Middle-earth, the world J.R.R. Tolkien created, there were ents, such as Treebeard, which are sentient beings that closely resemble trees. Ents can talk and listen and hold children with their limbs. Their purpose is to protect the woodlands from destruction. Tolkien, a Catholic, saw nature as needing protection from human beings intent on clearing forests. For him nature was a teacher of eternal truths.  

How often we walk down the shore, crunching small shells beneath our feet. A child will pick up the smallest one and treasure it like a gem. The child revels in God’s universe: a blade of grass, a pebble, a feather. In the Book of Job, we read: “Ask the beasts to teach you, and the birds of the air to tell you; Or the reptiles on earth to instruct you, and the fish of the sea to inform you. Which of all these does not know that the hand of God has done this? In his hand is the soul of every living thing.” (Jb 12:7-10).  

Later that day, I went into the side yard to check on the roses. The blackberry bushes had extended their leafy arms into the neighbors’ yard. Vines were entangled with the roses, so I tugged on them and they came loose. A feisty grasshopper had been nesting there and he hopped around in protest.  

It is too easy to walk by the trees, overlook the little voices in the undergrowth, forget about the clouds looking like bears and castles in the sky. Everything is bestowed upon us by God, an amazingly generous giver.  

We don’t have to book a nature cruise. We needn’t hike into an unexplored region. The hand of God is everywhere, even in our own yard. He calls to us from teetering treetops, humble hummingbirds and wary walking sticks. Let us pray to behold the everlasting light of God in the world around us.