When great trees fall, rocks on distant hills shudder, lions hunker down in tall grasses, and even elephants slumber after safety. When great trees fall in forrest, small things recoil into silence, their senses eroded beyond fear. When great souls die the air around us becomes light, rare sterile. We breathe briefly. Our eyes, briefly see with a hurtful clarity. Our memory, suddenly sharpened, examines, gaws on kind words unsaid, promised walks never taken. Great souls die and our reality, bound to them, takes leave of us. Our souls, dependent upon their nurture, now shrinks, wizened. Our minds, formed and informed by their radiance, fall away. We are not so much maddened as reduced to the unutterable ignorance of dark, cold caves. And when great souls die after a period peace blooms, slowly and always irregularly. Spaces fill with a kind of soothing electric vibration. Our senses restored, never to be the same, whisper to us. They existed. They existed. We can be. Be and be better. For they existed.
Maya Angelou
Wouter Nolet 1987 – 2019
