Ocean waves have a hypnotic affect as they crash ashore every few seconds. The water surges in an infinite number of patterns of encroach and retreat, and leaves shells, shark teeth, volcanic rock, and all manner of the remnants of ocean life in its wake. Something about the blue ocean waters and the waves that emerge out of a flat sea is calming and restorative to the human mind and soul. We seek out that joining place of ocean and sand, walk it, and something ancient resonates inside us.

If a child asked me a question that suggested even a faint awareness of the mystery behind the ar­rival of a migrant sandpiper on the beach of an August morning, I would be far more pleased than by the mere fact that he knew it was a sandpiper and not a plover. . . Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. Whatever the vexations or concerns of their personal lives, their thoughts can find paths that lead to inner contentment and to renewed excitement in living. Those who con­template the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of the birds, the ebb and flow of the tides, the folded bud ready for spring. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature-the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after the winter.
- Rachael Carson, The Sense Of Wonder

There is no drop of water in the ocean, not even in the deepest parts of the abyss, that does not know and respond to the mys­terious forces that create the tide. No other force that affects the sea is so strong. Compared with the tide the wind-created waves are surface movements felt, at most, no more than a hundred fathoms below the surface. So, despite their impressive sweep, are the planetary currents, which seldom involve more than the upper several hundred fathoms. The masses of water affected by the tidal movement are enormous, as will be clear from one ex­ample. Into one small bay on the east coast of North America -- Passamaquoddy -- two billion tons of water are carried by the tidal currents twice each day; into the whole Bay of Fundy, a hundred bil­lion tons....

   The tides are a response of the mobile waters of the ocean to the pull of the moon and the more distant sun. In theory, there is a gravitational attraction between every drop of sea water and even the outermost star of the universe. In practice, however, the pull of the remote stars is so slight as to be obliterated in the vaster movements by which the ocean yields to the moon and the sun. Anyone who has lived near tidewater knows that the moon, far more than the sun, controls the tides. He has noticed that, just as the moon rises later each day by fifty minutes, on the average, than the day before, so, in most places, the time of high tide is correspondingly later each day. And as the moon waxes and wanes in its monthly cycle, so the height of the tide varies. Twice each month, when the moon is a mere thread of silver in the sky, and again when it is full, we have the highest of the high tides, called the springs. At these times sun, moon, and earth are di­rectly in line and the pull of the two heavenly bodies is added together to bring the water high on the beaches, and send its surf leaping upward against the sea cliffs, and draw a brimming tide into the harbors so that the boats float high beside their wharfs. And twice each month, at the quarters of the moon, when sun, moon, and earth lie at the apexes of a triangle, and the pull of sun and moon are opposed, we have the least tides of the lunar month, called the neaps.

   That the sun, with a mass 27 million times that of the moon, should have less influence over the tides than a small satellite of the earth is at first surprising. But in the mechanics of the uni­verse, nearness counts for more than distant mass, and when all the mathematical calculations have been made, we find that the moon's power over the tides is more than twice that of the sun.
- Rachel Carson, The Sea Around Us

Access other favorite excerpts from Rachel Carson’s books here. Her work woke 1950s and 1960s had an impact on how we thought about nature and pesticides.

Below, a two page spread from the upcoming Heron Dance journal, Nurturing The Song Within. You can download a PDF here, or click in the image.
To be published in early March. You can pre-order the Collector’s Edition printed on premium paper, superb image reproduction quality, high-end binding, here.