A Reverence for Wilderness

 A Reverence for Wilderness

What is the modern voyager in the North wanting to discover?

From the canoe, he looks to see what is beyond the next headland.

On a trail-blazing portage, how to choose the best path where there is none.

From a deep sleep, the source of racket outside the tent. (Not a dream, a moose!)

This is adventure, but is that all it is? 

In the watery wilderness: a rock wall of ancient pictographs.

A sacred place for First People.

What do these paintings - a sunrise, a moose, canoes - say to us centuries later?

 

The painter knew the wilderness.

This was his world.

His painting, a prayer for success in the hunt, for maintaining life.

His painting was his reverence, his gratitude.

His Spirit and animal Spirit one. 

What is today’s wilderness traveler seeking?

A return to the natural world.

There, affirming his reverence for nature, the world’s and his own.

There, finding himself, deepening his commitment to an authentic life.

His discovery, once again, of Spirit within all creation.

His chapel, like the rock wall painter's, the woods and water.