a collection of ponderings

Upon pondering the crow who studied me with glass masquerade eyes

 

Leaves hang heavy on drooping branches in humid summer air, inspiring hackneyed existentialist revelations. There are too many here, maple, birch, cedar, pine, saturating the earth, overlaying life and all color until everything is lost in the ordinary. A juvenile crow waltzes around the base of an oak tree, seeking prey in the same ancient cracks in weathered bark. Bony talons brush the earth until forked tracks have become ingrained in soil. Bottomless eyes scan hazy foliage until they cross and become hazed over themselves, and the crow dances more frantically until he reaches his starting point. He shakes his head and glances at the sky. His dance begins again.

            Tomorrow we will all breath in green haze, man made now, because we must keep the illusion of life even after everything has withered away to other lands, lands where blue skies swallow sallow dry landscapes and the air draws moisture from bones, bleaching them brilliant white.

 

I wish that the bats who attacked you weren’t so small, because then they would have given you a concussion, and an excuse.

 

            Behind my house, there are squirrels as big as puppies. Someday, I will capture one and mail it to you so that you might enjoy a squirrel of unusual size too. I’ll send Band-Aids, because that squirrel will probably bite you, and it will be your fault. When we were six, I tried to teach you that. I tried to teach you that squeezing adorable things with teeth is a bad idea, but you never learned, and I chipped a tooth on your bracelet.

            In our river, there is a place where two 16 year old boys drowned. My neighbors fished one of them up in 1979. I don’t have any pictures, but I thought you would like to know. I thought you would like to know that actions have consequences.

            Behind the playground, the place where you came back to earth is still indented with your shape and soaked with your nose-blood. That tree tipped you over backwards. It was maybe six feet down. You landed on your knees and how you managed to break your nose is beyond me. But I warned you about that. I warned you about that so many times.

            I remember when you almost got hit by that car. You didn’t look before leaping, well, you never look, but this time it was physical, you running into the street. Death tried to kiss you at 45mph, but you jumped away and hit hot pavement with a wish and a giggle.

            Once, we went skiing down my basement stairs on cardboard and sleeping bags because you said your best friend had done it and it was fun. I wanted to kick you for saying that, but you beat me to it later when your shadow was flickering in a strobe light as you turned cartwheels and somersaults and I was gasping for breath on the floor.

             I think you almost broke my sternum.

            And I’ve come to the conclusion that you are kind of stupid.

Author's Note

hello again.