The world has become noise, silence its orphan child. The contemplative is a seed of silence planted amidst the jungle of noise, one whose harvest will come at a later time, perhaps a later age. The contemplative is a witness to silence, affirming that all things come out of silence and must return to silence to be healed and re-created.
A person is forced inward by the spareness of what is outward and visible in all this land and sky. The beauty of the Plains is like that of an icon -- what seems stern and almost empty is merely open, a door into simple and holy state.