Trapped in my home for a year during the time of the pandemic, I took to long walks through the forest at midnight, when no one else was around. On these quiet escapes through field and fen, I found myself struck by the conspicuous fact that, throughout it all, here in the patient indifference of night, the trees, and the stream, and the little moth in pursuit of her moon, these things remain; they quietly endure. Confined to our boxes and lost in the mist of our own misfortunes, it has become easy to forget that out here, even in the depths of winter at night, we are surrounded and carried by innumerable beings and relentless forces far more ancient and awesome than we.
