Chapel Hill Pond
To the birds
Sitting still on the edge of this pond is like perceiving the threshold of a world far older, and wiser, than myself.
The intricate details are so meticulous and precise that this could all be the realization of some master blueprint. There is something so hypnotic in watching the zigzagging movements of a caterpillar, feinting this way and that as it avoids the rolling pounds of the falling droplets of rain.
The sun still finds cracks in the clouds from which to peek as water drops from the sky, and I could be inside a universe made only for myself. The sounds of man are somehow muted here, and only the playful fountain and the hooting of birds keep time with the dull roar of thunder in the distance.
Tiny ants and wooly spiders share a truce as they pass each other by, keeping to their own business, and I think back to the works of White, which described an elderly wizard who knew of such things.
The standing graves are a testament to the people who broke the continuity of silence; interloping aliens in the privacy of my little rainy world.
I look out at the dissolving microscopic pillars that rise and fall, breaking the smooth surface of the lake, altering the mirrored illusion of tall firs and oaks fighting to rise up from the depths.
And as I watch my daughter laugh and shout with glee as swans eat lettuce from her outstretched hand, I know that this small chapter in my autobiography will be one that I will reread at a later date, when such peace is harder to come by.
