A Sage In A Slough

Seeking wisdom at sea level...

Mountaintops are cool. Don’t get me wrong. But wisdom, near as I can tell does not require thin air in order to be wisdom. And any truly earnest seeker of wisdom would only look the fool were he to walk right past it, there in the wide expanse of a tidal marshland, at sea level, while staring longingly at those elusive mountaintops far in the distance.

I went in search of wisdom a few days back, seeking the companionship of salt air and silence, duck wakes and marsh mud, and wren chatter. And maybe, if lucky the company and counsel of a great, wise, Blue Heron standing waist-deep in a muddy channel during a receding tide.

She was fishing for Sticklebacks …as is her way and unlike some of her brothers and sisters, and perhaps cousins, whom I queried before finding her, she held her ground, elegant and calm, listening carefully, trusting some mysterious intuition that I posed little threat, unwilling to give up that gravid current, that fishy, deep wade, rather than cursing the indignity of my approach, piercing the whisper and gurgle of watery silence with some disgruntled, dinosaur’s ‘Crawkkk,’ before taking wing.

I watched her stab and swallow five, maybe six Stickleback snacks, Three-spined (Gasterosteus aculeatus), or so it seemed, and not a one seemed to catch in her craw.

As she stared, translike, as she steadied herself against the flow and waited, and stabbed, I attempted to speak, to somehow align my complaints into an orderly procession, to give voice to the weight of my recent dismay.

She said nothing and continued to fish.

Three Trumpeter Swans flying low, and then two more. Their extended necks and streamlined flight, their soft, travel banter; white wings against blue-grey sky. As their voices faded toward the northeast, those soft sounds of moving water filled back in behind them like a sigh.

Another stab. A carefree toss…

I’d been kneeling atop that levy of gravel and mud for quite some time, knees and shins pressed low, sharp edged stones stabbing here and there, and a swelling awareness of fiery pins and needles growing from within.

I had lowered myself to lessen my threat, to gain connection and steady my hand, had needed to study her sagacious calm, this fishing sage, wanted her to see my earnestness, my devotion, my willingness to bow low. To wait for her reply.

If she was impressed in any way, she did not show it. But neither did she reject me by leaving.

It was the side-eyed gaze of a gliding Marsh Hawk that broke heron’s spell, that curious glance back as he slipstreamed, right to left.

“Why is that human creature kneeling in the mud?” I thought I heard him ask. And still, the fisherwoman said nothing.

Reclaiming upright posture takes longer these days. Knees complain and sometimes falter. Balance must awaken from its slumbers. After all those minutes in her close company I did not want then to frighten her, tumbling forward or suddenly reaching out, did not want to add even one jot to her tally of unseemly human behavior or give her any reason to regret her acquiescence. I was in her debt, after all.

Unbent and unkneeling, once again I bowed slowly, from the waist so as not to frighten; gratitude and respect. I reached past the temporal cruelty of those ten thousand pins and needles to thank her, sensing that somewhere in all that silence, all those stickleback fish, she had imparted some glimpse, some gift, a lightened heart, a share, if that is possible of her confident calm.

She continued to fish as I began to walk, both of us understanding that my movements so near to her required no evasion, no further attention.

In the distance I could hear the faint voice of a Marsh Wren with much that needed saying; I pressed forward, my ears suddenly hungry to hear.

I glanced back just the once. The waters of the receding tide were lower, had picked up speed …and there she stood, still, in a pool of light in the swirling midst of it all, mud and water, and marsh scented air, unflinching, unafraid, fully aware.

A sage in a slough.

Alive.

A Marsh Wren with much that needed saying…

And then, though the tide was out completely, a bit of her wisdom remained.

---