My aunt once heard Zen master Katagiri Roshi speak. She was deeply struck by one phrase in particular that he used: "The Silence of Trees Exactly." She said to me, "I'm not sure what it meant, but it stuck with me." It stuck with me, too, and I found myself thinking of this phrase on the evening that she died, just one week ago. "The Silence of Trees Exactly." The world indeed seemed more silent, more still than usual that night. Even our daughter Sophie seemed to sense it, observing to her father before bedtime that our house was suddenly very, very quiet. I imagine many of you also felt a strange stillness in the air that evening, a quiet that lingers still.

"The Silence of Trees." I keep thinking of my aunt, who spoke at our wedding of the trees of the mythical Forest of Arden. As many of you know, my aunt wrote her dissertation on Shakespeare, and she was enamored of Shakespeare's comedies, and of As You Like It in particular. When she officiated at our outdoor wedding celebration several years ago-and she did indeed "officiate," running the show like a magnificent high priestess-my usually soft-spoken aunt surprised everyone by flinging her arms wide and proclaiming with great gusto to the trees and the congregation alike: "Today we are here to witness a comedy!" A comedy. This was no ordinary wedding. But this was no ordinary minister, either. Having captured everyone's attention with her opening line, she then continued in this way (and these are her words):

"We are here to witness a comedy. I'm talking about something very like a Shakespearean comedy, one that takes place in a 'green world,' to which many persons have come from various noisy and even threatening locales. 'So this is the Forest of Arden," says Rosalind, the heroine of As You Like It. The characters have fled to the Forest as Jennifer and David have come to the country here at Sunset View Farm to delight in its serenity…And we who are here tonight with them also immerse ourselves in the natural rhythms of life so easily forgotten in the city."

I keep picturing my aunt's beloved cabin, the place she referred to as Peace Hill, nestled in a "green world" perhaps not unlike the Forest of Arden. My aunt was, among many, many, many things, a lover of trees. There exists a wonderful bit of Mattern home movie footage, circa 1973 or 1974, of my aunt, long-haired and tan, lying on her back under the dogwood tree in front of our house, picking blossoms and putting them in her hair while my brother and I played nearby. And just last year, when she visited us for the first time at our new home in Massachusetts, the first thing she did was to lead our barefoot, one-year-old, newly walking Sophie into our backyard, to point out the different types of evergreens to her-trees that we ourselves had taken for granted.

"The Silence of Trees Exactly." It occurs to me only now that the silence of trees is a fleeting thing. Stand in a silent wood or in a quiet grove of trees, and you know without a doubt-you expect, even-that it will only be a matter of moments before another wind blows through, or a breeze passes by to set the leaves rustling once again. The silence of trees is never a permanent state. And I cannot help but think that this stillness, this quiet that has settled upon us with the news of her death, is a temporary state. The wind has let up for a moment in the Forest of Arden, that's all.

I want to tell you that we, too, are witnessing a comedy today. My aunt explained it this way: "Traditional Shakespearean comedy begins in confusion. Characters lose track of one another in the woods, they see fairies and sprites, they hide behind trees and hear what they shouldn't. They always mistake appearance for reality."

I will dare to tell you this today: that we, the supporting cast of characters, have simply lost track of our favorite heroine in the woods. I like to think she is hiding behind the next tree over, just out of sight, eavesdropping on us. Let us not mistake the absence of her tangible presence as reality. The genuine, authentic reality is this: in Shakespeare as in life, the comic heroine never dies. A tragic heroine, perhaps, but a comic heroine, never. The history of world literature is on our side on this one. That, and the fact that my aunt would be utterly appalled at any sort of casting that featured her as a tragic heroine.

It is true that her during her life's work she bore witness to a great deal of pain and suffering. She bore witness to profound tragedy, almost daily. She chose to use her life to serve the castaways, the castoffs-migrant farmworkers, death-row inmates, Iraqi women and children, the poor of our country and abroad. And yet, my aunt was loath to cast anyone she worked with as a tragic figure. I think she sensed that doing so would invoke pity instead of inviting action. And, as we all know, my aunt was all about action.

And here is what I have always found remarkable about my aunt's particular brand of "action": When there was no more to be done, when battles had been fought and lost, she continued to act by bearing witness to the injustice she saw in the world. Bearing witness-writing and speaking and praying-never turning away from those who were crying out to be seen, to be heard. By bearing witness, she inspired countless others to take a stand, and to realize that the word "anonymous" is a dangerous one indeed.

Some of you may have read the Raleigh News & Observer article written about my aunt recently-it mentioned that those who worked with her often likened her to "a tree standing tall in the face of injustice." I wonder if the writer realized how apt a description that was.

And yet, there was more, so much more. I fear that those who did not know her will read of her and her work and imagine her stoic, stern, distastefully serious. I would tell them this: One Christmas Eve, en route from North Carolina to our house in Philadelphia, she rescued a turtle with a cracked shell from the middle of the road and brought him to us in a Kentucky Fried Chicken box. By the time he reached us, she had already named him-Torquemada, after one of the Grand Inquisitors of the Spanish Inquisition.

I would tell them that she loved all animals, not just box turtles. I would tell them that she loved her dog, Paz, and was heartbroken by her passing. I would tell them that she loved children and loved babies, that she couldn't get enough of her great-nephew and great-nieces. I would tell them that she loved the name Desdemona Patchouli and suggested, in fact, that my parents name me this. I would tell them that she gave me the Anthology of Negro Poetry when I was seven, and that recently, she gave two-year-old Sophie a book called The History of Colors-written by a Mexican revolutionary. I would tell them of her poetry, her books. I would tell them of the legends, always mentioned in a whisper, never confirmed: that she once befriended Bianca Jagger on a plane. That she planted geraniums in the toilets at the Pentagon, as a peace protest. That the FBI had her on file. I would also tell anyone who asked-and those who did not think to-that her glass was not just half full, but fairly brimming with hope and gratitude, and with laughter unearthed in the most unexpected of places. I would tell them that her world was as lush and green and vibrant as the Forest of Arden, and just as wonderfully unpredictable.

Today, the magical Forest of Arden is silent, and we are uncomfortable in its stillness. The loss of her physical presence has rendered us tongue-tied. What can be said of such an extraordinary person, such a remarkable spirit? The words come too fast, or not at all. But in gathering here today, we echo her life. We bear witness to a life of witness. And soon, the wind will return to the forest, and we will hear her again, in the leaves rustling overhead. We will see her again, in the work of others, in the work of each other, popping her head out from behind a tree. Our comic heroine is not so far away-she is only a few trees ahead. So let the comedy continue. In Shakespeare's words, from As You Like It, words that my aunt also shared at our wedding:

There is mirth in heaven
When earthly things made even
Atone together

Aunt Linda, you will surely have little to atone for. And now that you are there, there is even more mirth in heaven. Lucky them. And lucky us, to have played a part in your comedy. We'll meet you on the other side of the forest.