The silence of snow :: Winter’s soul

Perhaps what moves us most in winter is some reminiscence of far-off summer. How we leap by the side of the open brooks! What beauty in the running brooks! What life! What society! The cold is merely superficial; it is summer still at the core, far, far within. [. . .] I hear faintly the cawing of a crow far, far away, echoing from some unseen wood-side, as if deadened…It mingles with the slight murmur of the village, the sound of children at play, as one stream empties gently into another, and the wild and tame are one. What a delicious sound! It is not merely crow calling to crow, for it speaks to me too. I am part of one great creature with him; if he has voice, I have ears. I can hear when he calls. . .

— Henry David Thoreau

Snow surrounding the creek and covering the trees
Standing near a creek with snow covering its banks and the surrounding trees
Looking across a snow-covered field toward the woodland with a creek winding away on the left
A footbridge, trees, and creek doused with snow, and some buildings nestled in the background

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