On A Brief Walk

On a walk this morning through mild air and wan sunlight, I saw the baskets of dried Queen Anne's lace holding small mounds of snow as if in a cupped hand; raised to the light, the flakes of snow glistened. I looked from near to far and saw a beautiful world of snow and branch, hill and field, and felt full of deep happiness and gratitude, touched to tears. I would like to share a quote from William James that expresses something of my feeling:

To be rapt with satisfied attention, like Whitman, to the spectacle of the world's presence, is one way, and the most fundamental way, of confessing one's sense of its unfathomable significance and importance.