Merry, Pippin and the Wind

"You're very small."

Pippin looked up from his canteen of water.  "That's nice."

Merry frowned at him.  "What's nice?"

"Calling me small."

"I didn't call you small."

"You said, 'you're very small.'"

"And eat a lot."

Merry and Pippin stared at each other in consternation.  "What was that?" they asked together.

"Hello."

They looked around.  "Who's talking?"  Pippin was decidedly uncomfortable. 

"I'm all around you, everywhere."

Merry scrunched up his face.  "How can you be all around?  Are you more than one?"

"I am many, many, but all at once and all the time, anywhere."

Pippin stood up and looked around.  "What does that mean?  Are you in the air?"

"I am the air.  The moving, brushing, swirling, dancing air.  Most call me the wind.  Hello."

Pippin's jaw dropped.  "Do you talk like this to everyone?" Merry asked.

"I'm watching, all the time, watching everyone.  I speak to all, but only a few listen.  You were listening."

Merry looked at his friend.  Pippin seemed thoughtful.  "I wasn't really listening, just thinking."

"You heard me moving on the moors and rustling in the grass, and the bare, hollow sound of me made you think of home and how the wind doesn't get down in between hobbit holes.  Out here, I'm all over where you've never seen me before."

The two hobbits sat quietly in the grass, dumbfounded.  "What do you look like?"  Merry finally asked.

"You know, like rough stones and rippling waters and creaking branches and hair in your face.  I the breath of the sky, of the earth."

Merry smiled.  Pippin put out his hand and felt the breath across his fingers.