Poetry and Music | Nature’s Love Song

I found myself humming on the trail the other day.

Accidentally. No fanfare of emotion. No cinematic swell. Just humming—like my body had quietly wandered off and joined a different conversation without asking my brain for permission. I laughed out loud and then, humbled, kept going.

That’s when it hit.

Music and poetry have this uncanny ability to penetrate our thinking self and stir the beautiful chaos inside. Nature does that too, less ceremoniously and with zero regard for our preparedness.

One moment you are consciously managing your internal hard drive, the next you are humming into the trees as if they might be humming back.

This is nature’s love song. Weird. Playful. Completely uninterested in winning our approval.

Trail Maestro

I did not set out that day in search of any insight. I simply needed earth, air, and motion—something raw enough to shake loose.

The trail promptly took over.

Roots tripped up my stride. Turns took my focus. My breath stopped trying to be efficient and started being true. The rhythm came before the motivation ever could. It felt less like running and more like being swept into something already moving.

Humming appeared like the best music always does—uninvited, familiar, grounding in a way that made no logical sense at all. Like the trail leaned in close and said, “Rock and Roll. Just stay with me.” The humming shows up like our favorite song on shuffle—no warning, no logic, just instant recognition.

Poetry, Music, the Wordless You

Poetry gives language to the unnameable. Music speaks where words fall apart. Nature skips translation entirely.

In the wild, metaphors don’t require subtitles. The horizon stretches like an invitation. The wind taps a rhythm out across your skin. The light filtering through the trees edits your thinking without permission.

We don’t listen with our ears. We listen with our body. Our breath. That internal place that cares little about meaning and everything about how things vibe.

Soon down the trail, I fell into the same quiet alignment—movement, breath, attention all humming on the same page. It reminded me of something Dōgen once wrote:

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“Do not think you will necessarily be aware of your own enlightenment.”

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If it shows up for the blink of a lightning bug, I’m in.

Which, at the time, felt exactly right. No fireworks. Just a quiet internal exhale—ahhh.

Dirty Zen Likes some Dirt

Nature doesn’t serve up an experience with handles. It offers us sweat, knotted hair, dust on our calves, wind in our eyes, and that untamed feeling that remembers another rhythm. And for some reason, that’s the music.

That's unchoreographed Dirty Zen—getting messy enough to fall into the rhythm. It’s jazz, not a symphony. Improvised. Responsive. Occasionally a little offbeat. Beautiful precisely because it’s alive.

Where the Love Song Lives

Outdoors there is a point when the internal din quiets. Thoughts stop elbowing their way to the front. The body stops bracing. You feel yourself wider without trying to make yourself so.

That is the chorus.

Music does it when it’s honest. Poetry when it’s brave. Nature—no apologies. No analysis. Just experience.

Holding the Note

Near the end of that run, humming faded—not because the song stopped, but because it had settled in. Like the best music that stops playing but vibrates on long after we hear it—somewhere behind our ribs.

I slowed my pace. Let the horizon meet me. Let the trail finish its thought. Poetry and music pen and strum the way. The wild keeps the rhythm.

The rhythm—you know that awesome hit, like the trail slips into your chest and starts keeping time.

And before you know it, you’re humming again, already back in it.

Cheers!

Kether

Spunky Mind

“Everything is already singing.”

-Rainer Maria Rilke