in the background “I wish you were here” is playing, somewhat muted from the other room, but such an easy sentiment, so true, and I do, looking out the sliding glass window door at a fall, well, the fall has happened, just the outlines, the bare bones of trees now, with giant lollipop tufts of leaves that the squirrels have devised and deployed as housing, not much camouflage now, not needed I guess, my the little buggers have grown quite fat, nearly falling off the limbs like overmatched wallendas, not the daring darters and dashers of just a few months past, a hawk is circling high above, but they pay no mind, I half expect to see a scene out of one of those wildlife documentaries, but nothing happens, just a feeling of stillness as I watch the outside world move about, a stiff breeze bends my bamboo halfway down, puddles have gathered where they decided to form a crowd, standing alone in the house, the colors are not dreary, just certainly not bright, every shade of brown imaginable, and wet bark, tends to be blackish, every once in a while there is a flash of bright color, a cardinal, or a bluejay will swoop in and steal my eye, but mostly the monotony of brown, I hear no sounds of the outside, just the song, and my mind…
“How I wish, how I wish you were here
We’re just two lost souls swimming in a fishbowl year after year
Running over the same old ground, what have we found?
The same old fears, wish you were here”
I feel time flowing around me, like a standing ‘henge rock in a river, for at least a respite, before I am swept with the rest of it, I’m not sad, no, more of just empty, or deprived of what I once had, no blame, no anger, none of that matters now, never did but stole those moments anyway back then, those days, not today, for I am in the here now, regardless of good fate or bad, there is no turning back, just this pause, as I try to lose myself in the minutia of squirrels in their world, in my backyard, mine, at least for a time, a lifetime just a stitch in this quilt, if that much, deep breath the experience in, fading into my own pale reflection in the glass now, staring, at myself, no, through myself, no doubt, I am the sum of what stands here, maybe I won the argument, maybe I stood by principle, maybe I was right, maybe I was wrong, that has all washed away now, inside these bones the truth takes hold.
“So, so you think you can tell
Heaven from Hell? Blue skies from pain?
Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil? Do you think you can tell?
Did they get you to trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees? Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change? Did you exchange
A walk-on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?”
-fin, fade to gray
notes… the quotes are obviously from the Pink Floyd tune above… do I need to even say that? perhaps…. I don’t want to be accused of stealing things, those words are surely not mine, part of my post, and the inspiration, that they are.
Shades of My Garden 