“Because all creatures are connected, each must be cherished with love and respect, for all of us as living creatures are dependent on one another.” – Pope Francis

The forest is dark, but not quiet. Crickets, cicadas, foxes, owls, coyotes, frogs, and countless others all call out as they go about their nocturnal duties.

A blue jay calls out a single, long clear note into the night. This is answered by another, and another, until several jays are exchanging notes across a circle up in the trees. The jays position themselves to catch the patches of dappled moonlight coming through the trees, so each one seems to possess a Cherenkov-blue glow.

Soon other forest denizens respond in their own way, adding their notes to the whole, and take up places in the moonlight to glow in their own fashion. Owls and vultures up in the tree tops, crickets down on the forest floor, coyotes come, adding their bass howls, the tree frogs in a tilted circle, all forming a sphere. Even those who normally do not communicate vocally, like the deer, rabbits and lizards come to contribute their presence.

So far this Sphere has been defined only by the sounds around it, but now the trees and plants lean towards the edge of The Sphere, giving it a physical shape. Fireflies light the vague boundaries.

The Song that forms is not so much a song of melodies and lyrics, but of lives. Lives that are intricately interconnected, each one dependent on each and every other one, all reliant on each other. Even as they compete with, or prey upon, each other, they’re all still working in concert to ensure the survival of the whole.

A soft white glow forms in the center of The Sphere, filling it with a welcome and welcoming presence…

Not far away, another creature senses the rite in progress and awakens from a dream-laden sleep. This creature is not like the others. Physically they are almost indistinguishable, having a familiar 4-limbed format and the same basic DNA-driven processes that all life here uses. But this creature knows nothing of The Song, and that makes all the difference in The World.

The creature climbs out of a fabric shelter that is made of nothing found in the forest, and moves towards The Song, shining and following a light neither bio-luminescent nor celestial.

Upon reaching the place of The Sphere, the creature beholds ….

…… nothing. The forest is dark, but not quiet. Crickets, cicadas, foxes, owls, coyotes, frogs, and countless others all call out as they go about their nocturnal duties.

The creature follows the light that is neither bio-luminescent nor celestial back to the fabric shelter that is made of nothing found in the forest, and knows something, something of vital importance, has been missed and lost, but just might be found again, and not far away.