new jersey blog – Shades of My Garden

(my actual vantage as I was inspired to write)

“a hope of light”
and reminders, signs, talismans, so obvious as to be screaming whispers vibrating in obedient corners, all there – hidden in the plainest of sight, a hope of light…
as today I was a wheelbarrow more than a man, drawn out like a mule, to drag payloads back and forth, never in balance like once was new, and gravity has a way of multiplying the trade pay, the yoke, the wear, and there is less lubrication these days between the ground pounding and my bearings, even I would admit the tread is worn from sun and toil, but I would argue there is still good rubber there, but after the day the wheelbarrow must go back in storage, to the garage home, bringing dings, dirt and memories caked on, reminded, nothing is ever new again once out of the box, certainly not now these years of use altered… so arrives home…
the patience I might have left the house with a full tank, that has now been spent, every inch of me ready to pounce at every little non-event, of words, of even good intent, even though I know, I am a porcupine wound, can’t everyone just see, just read, the glaring signs, and make no sound, shall I pass by, until at least I may come on down, or let the tension un-bound, I manage not to wreck the crew… somehow…
so, not wanting to tie myself into a fight or fits, I park myself outside, look upward for some guidance, to what is left of the fleeting day sky, and to be entranced by – the hope of light, that promise, the next morning, another glory yearning, and the next, until there is none, the rest seems to slip away, the tension locked in my jaw starts to fade, the pressure in my temples begins to contract, a breeze comes along to rest on my cheek, a family of deer creep along my yard, unaware of me being disarmed, for maybe a minute ago they might have sensed the will of a frothing hunter out for blood, but that base urge has melted down and gone, replaced with thankful tranquility, a cure for humanity, or perhaps just the elixir to wash away the non-humanity we engage in every day, so I bathe in – a hope of light…

(a spur of the moment / freeform post)

snow, -the weight, snow had broken the back of a tree, an old pine, not tall, but stout, the kind you could make a teapot song about, covered the view to the boring side of the neighbor’s house, taken for granted until now, now split in two from the sheer weight of snow more than a few weeks ago, so, even though the hour is late for such things, evening, the air is crisp, borderline cold, but just enough, enough to be a refreshing refreshment rather than an impediment to work, no breeze tonight, no breeze to chill the hairs on my arms to stand at arms, just the sharp clean air as an infusion and invitation to engage the evening, and then the pine, pine has such a distinct smell, how could I forget, as I clipped off the branches outward in, with large hand clippers, with almost bonsai-like detail, such a divine smell, one of those things a memory never forgets, a transportation to the first time in a forest, or touching the sap on cones thrown like footballs as a child, or cones laced with peanut butter and nuts strung up for a squirrels delight, pine, one of the only green statues to stand up to winter, even now as the season is changing, forsythia has shone golden light on the dulled lands, ramps have burst through like tufts of rebellious hair forts, here and there, daffodils round out the crew, even here, at night, trimming the branches down of this broken pine, soon will come the giving rains, and the explosion of life, the glory of spring, but now this sits a time, somewhere between dawn and full sunrise, ah, the smell of pine, as I trim and opine...

Shades of My Garden

a window into a life, a conversation with a soul, a gateway to a heart

Tag: new jersey blog

thoughts from the porch… (a hope of light)

pine soul…