Glory, Green Cay

The boardwalk unfurls over the looking glass lake at Green Cay Wetlands. It’s dawn yet nature is already hard at work making the world a better place. The spindly yellow talons of the tri-colored heron rushing along the railing echo the fluorescent sneakers of the woman strolling by. Red winged blackbirds trill, iridescent grackles squawk, and tree ducks whistle their sunrise symphony. Orange swaths of sky peek out behind puffs of gray cotton ball clouds silhouetting a wedge of egrets floating right over your head.

In a breath, it all turns golden, crimson, a smudge of pink. 

Your skin tingles from a soft, pale breeze the same way your mouth feels when you inhale after eating peppermint. The evolving sky, now whitewashed in light, is rendered a cinematic backdrop for anhingas perched on branches, their oily black wings spread open to dry. The white egrets telescope their S-curved necks, hovering their needled beaks above the lush, swampy marsh ready to poke their prey. Big bodied wood storks parade by, their menacing, long, black bills at the ready to forage unsuspecting insects, fish, and frogs. No hard feelings, they’re just doing their jobs.

Elusive roseate spoonbills appear to a chorus of gasps. With their soft pink wings, they alight on the spongy ground, sloshing, stirring, and mingling with the glossy ibis, as the sunlight bounces off the water like paparazzi flashes. With nary an alligator in sight, giant turtles meander below the murky surface and the ducks dip and bob underwater, white tail feathers exposed like bloomers. 

The enchanted forest of statuesque cabbage palmettos, spiky slash pines, and bald cypress shroud the boardwalk. Their dignified beauty belies their twisted branches, off-center trunks, and knarled roots.

Right here is your school - come ready to learn a language with no words.

Do trees long for the freedom of the birds, can the birds understand the flow of the river, are you aware of the voice of the breeze?

Listen closely to the sagacious tidings. 

And the trees sing,

With outstretched arms, we receive. 

In our differences, we stand together. 

From our difficulties, we rise.

Glory, hallelujah.