Animal Voices
dawn baumann brunke
Introduction
When my husband Bob died, our journey did not end. What began with the numbing shock and disorientation of loss shifted into conversation — one that unfolded in shared feelings, dreams, and the subtle language of the heart. Over time, it grew into an ever-widening exploration of life, death, and the spaces in-between.
In the first book of this journey, I shared the earliest weeks of our dialogue: tender, raw, surprising — fragile, yet luminous too. We discovered that communication between the living and the after-living is not only possible but natural — a bridge formed of love and expanding presence. Those early conversations revealed that death did not end our relationship. Rather, it changed its form, inviting us to meet in another way.
While that first book was about discovering the bridge between life and afterlife, this one is about walking it — exploring what unfolds as we journey together, often arriving in places we never expected.
Something extraordinary happened as we continued to converse every morning. We spoke in words as well as shared thoughts and feelings. Sometimes we met in dreams — imaginal realms alive with symbols, doorways, and revelations, encouraging us to step into what we most needed to know. Some days were dreamlike too — reveries and daydreams appearing like messengers, each one a spark of reassurance, a clue, a reminder of the more-than-ordinary world that surrounds us.
Through this, we grew more familiar with the fluid borderlands between life and afterlife. We became more fluid too — more easily shifting perspectives, finding new ways of seeing and feeling, learning how realities can tilt and layer. All of it became a playful (though sometimes challenging) exploration of perception and creation.
We went on journeys, both alone and together — past the River of Forgetting, into the Mountain of Knowing. We stood before doorways, wandered into danger zones, cleared the rubble of what we no longer needed. We learned to step through obstacles, not by force but by trust. What felt impossible began to open. What felt broken revealed itself as whole — a clearer, more expansive version of reality. We were deepening in the mystery of our togetherness.
The terrain of this book is many-layered. We venture through patterns of love and loss, sudden shocks and unexpected turns, and the widening of consciousness beyond form. We encounter joy, resistance, humor, tenderness, and guidance from beings both seen and unseen. We learn to value presence and persistence. At times, the terrain disorients. Other times, it shines with clarity. Always, it asks us to stretch into more.
This book is a lived experience — one that welcomes you to walk alongside us, to listen for echoes in your own life, to feel into the textures of your own connections. Perhaps you will build your own bridges — to dreams, to loved ones both here and beyond, to the unseen places where life and afterlife touch.
What Bob and I have discovered — and what we hope shines through these pages — is that love is far more enduring and expansive than we ever imagined. Relationship does not end with death. It shifts. It changes shape, inviting us to follow. And in following, we too are changed.
So step with us onto this bridge of connection and exploration — into shared conversation, into dreams, into the boundless nature of consciousness and the transformative power of love. Let the conversations unfold. See what possibilities emerge for you.