Life

I uncovered the sparrow’s nest in the woodpile. It was made of hay, stiff, strong and light with a perfect oval dent. My brother, the engineer.

Have you ever wondered – he says one Thursday night –whether most of what we call lifeis – actually –just static?Is day-to-day reality the popcorn at the movieor the back-of-class giggling?Is it the squeak in the trunkor the clicking of the fridge?Is it possible the news and the socialsand the jobs and the Dowsare the…

Those loons, which must knowtheir warm water will shortly freeze.Do they worry? Or do they just fly? The monarchs, so tissue-flimsyand buffeted by the wind,they have an odyssey ahead.But are they afraid? And the woodchuck,hungry all summerfor a winter at rest.Does it care how the snow will pile? The world turns and they turn with…

What is it to breathe in the worldand let the lungs fillwith damp leaves, sandy dunes, rot? Can we sense the pine, the hay,feel the stream, touch the rock? Will we let the world permeate and saturate,so we know – at last – it’s where we belong?

I watched the sun go down last night. And I thought, how strange: the perfect distance, the ideal gravity, the right molecules. All of itso I could witness a sinking star and wonder what to make for dinner.

What do we do when there are no right answers?When things are complicated, inexplicable,uncertain? Where do we send our desperate, hunting mindsthat are famished to know? Do we make up an answer, a story?A belief? Or can we dive into the deep, blue poolof unknowing,throw our heads backand float?

Somewhere deep inside the chest, perhapsbetween the lungs and certainly behindthe jailhouse ribs, is a little box of OKness. We were born with this boxand we will die with this box, but formost of our lives we forget it’s there. Instead, we occupy ourselves with ourday-to-day. We launch careersand start families, we cook dinnersand watch…

At the start of autumn,when the leaves are falling,a bird flutters upwards. Such a curious joy.

Whenever there’s a tinge of upsetness or not-rightness,I like to ask my body:Hi, body, what’s up? Is there anything going on you’d like to tell me?And my body would say:You know what? I’m feeling a little fluttery in the gut or my shoulders are tight.And so I’d sit and let my body send its signals,like…

Can we, just for a moment,arrest the desire to name and claim,to identifyand investigate? Can we stop the whens, the whats, the hows,and the becauses? Can we instead sink into the not-knowing,the nothing and the everything,and allow its beautyto saturate us?

Today is a day for the small things. The sparrow, which so bravely sang,is now half-bird, half-leaf,shyly rustling the raspberry,while a bee nuzzling the ragweedthirstily races the setting sunand a brave, blue flowerthis morning dares bloom— frost tonight. Today is a day to notice the small thingsand know they – too –are part of the…

At equinox twilight the world hangs,half day, half night,while the wind holds its breathand only the squirrels cheekily darelaugh at tomorrow. Because they made plans.

When the sky’s as blue as it is today,I want to dive into it and swim,to lose myself in its clearness and pureness. Until I realize it’s the thinnest of stripes,and beyond, there’s blackness and airlessness and gamma raysthat would zap me. So I stay down here and make a cup of tea.

Amid the blackened thistles,the frayed leaves,the stealthy fungusand the last white daisies. Amid the crow’s squawk,the osprey’s peepand the maple’s creak. Amid the dusty barkand the rotting log. There is the scent of decay. And then a mouse flits across the road.Like a living ghost.

The woodchuck, which one day sniffed my shoebefore waddling to seek more clover,is gone. Like the summer that closed when the chill cameand the frost threatened,it departed too soon. Was I wrong to love something that could leave so easily?

Sometimes, when the day’s been long …

I challenge you to go outside
and feel the sun and smell the air
and hear the crickets and see the daisy…
and not fall back in love with the world you’re part of.

The slabby rock behind my house has been around for a billion years, give or take. It will outlast me, already halfway through this thing called life. But when I scramble up close and investigate, when I poke my fingers at its scaly surface or find the maple saplings prying open its crevices, I notice…

There’s that moment, at the edge of a cloud, when the rain considers.A splatter of drops, then none, then a splatter more.Until the cloud says, let’s be done with it, let’s let loose, here we go.And the rain barrels down, unconstrained, because to hell with it.Until, relaxed, the cloud moves on with an end-of-party fade,…

Sometimes I can be still and breathe,and steep in the mellow soup of OKness,where I know that nothing can harm meand that all is well and all is good.And then I remember I’ve got to pay the Visa bill.

I know that 2 + 2 = 4 and it’s πr2 for something else.And if I drive 60 mph for half an hour, I’ll be 30 miles away. This tree is made of atoms,which are made of protons and neutrons and electrons,which are made of smaller particles like a quark,or another thing, teeny and strangely…

Sometimes I find my heart racing and my breath short as I twist on yesterday’s problems and tomorrow’s to-dos. Then I notice a chickadee on the tree outside. It’s so light and fluffy and OK.

An empty, empty morning with nothing but the wind. That breeze, touching the leaves of the aspen. Those leaves, which jostle and chatter. And through the window, I see shivering. That wind, from Huron or Calgary, filling my senses. Because I’m part of the world which is part of me.

They’re burning the old cottage at the bottom of the hill.Gone are the beams that held up the roof,which shouldered the snow.Ash are the planks that made the floorand shielded dry socks.Cinders are the panels that covered the walls,which hung the painting of a moose in the woods.And then there’s me, sitting on my bench…

Most mornings, I’m a little in awe when the sun comes up and the world fills with light and I get to say good morning to the one I love. I guess there’s a part inside me that thinks it’s all so improbable.

There’s a ripe peach inside my chest, delicate and soft. Why do I carry that peach with me, so easily hurt and vulnerable? Is the peach part of me? Can I let it out? Can I protect it in a stiff, hard case? Or can I allow it to be squished a little, knowing its…

I’ve lived in many places; I’ve traveled to even more. There’s succulent London, with its trains and Tubes, it’s vascular Thames and shiny shops. Or proud Leeds, Victoria’s finest just a skip from the limestone Dales and their gurgling streams and noisy sheep. Or solid Birmingham, with its roads and its canals; its criss-crossing railways…

I don’t know where that wind is from or why the air’s so chill. I’ve no clue where the woodchuck is – sleeping or plucking fruit in the berry field? Why have the birds disappeared? Where have they flown and when? That plant newly flowering when its brother is dead – a mystery I cannot…

Snarl on the highway. Lineup at Foodland. Out of mint tea and only four sprouts left. Computer’s updating. Door’s blowing open. There’s a wasp elbow deep in my cold can of Coke. Garbage is stinking. Windows are streaking. Gooey mud on my shoes from the flood on the hill. Rocks formed of stardust. Oaks making…

Once I drove into a moose and believed I was going to die. In the future I might be poor, alone and living by the side of the road. Here’s a bowl of strawberry ice cream and it’s delicious.

They’re chipping wood at the bottom of the hill. I can smell tree meat; it smells good and now I feel guilty. Because look what I’ve done. Inconvenient branches, sawed, blitzed. A beautiful form, destroyed. But maybe… Tree branches, to chips, to mulch, to rot, to soil – to trees? (Humans, to corpses, to coffins,…

My car plays music. Not just Sirius XM and its 70s on 7, Jim Croce and Jethro Tull. Or Taylor Swift on the Moose with ads for beds from Leon’s. No, my car is an orchestra. The tud-bump of tires over a break in the asphalt. The inhale of the engine as it attacks a…

First there’s the big, bold sunset, so spectacular put-on-a-show. Then tiny sparrow, piping the same – soon familiar – tune. Next comes the wind, rushing southward, playing the leaves in waves. And later the gift of rain: pummeling, drizzling, spotting, gone. And before long, I’m in love with my heavy knife, that firm apple, this…

Gas in the car – up 10 centsGarbage to the dump – damn bag split3 two-by-fours – no red paintSquirrel on the road – get outta wayDriver going 40 – what’s wrong with you?All these problems faced by me‘Cuz I’m in the world, not of it

Are we ever there if we’re not aware? If we’re in the woods and fail to notice the creak of the maples? Or if the musical rhythm of the lake’s waves laps us by? Can we say we’ve been somewhere if we don’t see the shades of the rocks and the shadows through the leaves?…

I’m sitting on a bench outside my house. It’s four feet wide – enough for two, if that’s your thing. I’m waiting for nothing. Stillness, you see, is my superpower: Birds surprise my ears, a squirrel shoots between my legs. The boy deer is back, nibbling at the oaks I newly planted. A baby raccoon…

For Freddie – the goodest dog in the world – everything old is also new. On that same maple with the broken branch chats a cheeky squirrel, too far to leap. There’s a raccoon been under the dusty brush pile. But when? But how? What’s with the mushroom that wasn’t on the lawn? Where did…

Ten minutes by bike (all downhill) from the house I grew up in was Bobbits Lane. And down Bobbits Lane was a wheat field, a meadow, some allotments and the sewage works. To the right was Spring Wood, which was ancient and ended abruptly at the A14. I would bike down here, on my own,…

Tiny seeds that flirt with the sun and fall like sparks. The hummingbird, so hurrying bird for that next frantic hit. This turpentine pine cone, warm and gluey. Two dead grasshoppers in the screened-in porch. Got in. Trapped. Thin. Shiny grass. Surprising breezes. Loam. All these small things, so easy to love. And the big…

I don’t want to go skydiving or rock climbing. I won’t jump between rooftops or race Highway 401. Instead, I’ll sit here, feeling mortal and adoring the scent of the forest.

I’m surrounded by birds. I can hear their beating wings, their squawking and tweeting, pecking, drumming. Flocks of birds. Birds I haven’t seen before, black and white birds, birds that creep up trees, birds that peck at gutters, yellow-headed birds. I have no idea what they’re all called. And that’s OK because once I name…

I’m getting accustomed to the whole Covid thing. But from time to time, I see a familiar place turned apocalyptic, with the masks and the distancing and such. That sends a chill up my body, like the time I was a kid and I realized for the first time I too would die one day.…

I got two bush cords of firewood delivered this week; truckloads tipped with the sound of thunder. There are round logs and square logs, wedge logs and deformed logs. Wood with latticy fungus or a cancery burl. And when its stacked (and it will be, soon), all that is littered is scraps and splints and…

One day in – I don’t know – 2002, I found myself in the Catalan seaside town of Sitges. I was stress-working in Amsterdam, flew to visit a friend in Barcelona and…well… I just needed a break alone. So I took the train past the airport, got off in Sitges – and found a cafe…

I’m from England, where it rains from time to time. I remember as a kid in the back of the car, following the drops on the windows as they jigged and jagged earthward, absorbing and engorging with brakes-failed momentum. Or the November puddles on the black roads, which slobbered a wobbly red under the traffic…

Where do we go when we’re asleep? Are we like the bee on the thistle? Fuzzy yellow on spiky purple, a color wheel contrast in stillness? Are we like the barbecue spider? An eight-legged cast that no fly might wake? Are we like caterpillar goo? Denatured? Deconstructed? Dissolved? DNA? Or are we like me? Snoring…

I was sitting on my couch the other day, looking out the window and thinking about this and that. Along came a flock of tiny birds, into the frame from left to right. Fluttering so gently from branch to branch. I watched them pass. Into the frame, out of the frame. How fascinating they were!…

We have a woodchuck that lives with us. Well, not in the house (we have no wood to chuck) but around and about, on the sandy bank and the weedy septic. It has a condo in the rock face crack, with a roof terrace and eighth floor balcony. That’s the kind of real estate you…

That patch of light. You see? The one that’s making the leaves of the raspberry bush shine so white? That patch of light, whose photons journeyed 93 million miles to bounce off the leaves of the raspberry bush and make them shine so white? That patch of light, which is forcing a squint as the…

The secret to viewing shooting stars, as I discovered while I lay on the gently rocking dock, with the crickets buzzing behind me and the Milky Way misting across the blackness, is not to look for them. Instead, it’s to wait… and then see. Meteors punish effort. Seek in the north-west, or at Perseus, or…