State of Mind

I was asked tonight what rodent I thought might be eating the front corner of the garage at a property I have listed for sale.

I am sitting in the garden, minding my own business and ignoring that bit of work.

With headphones. My son in the kitchen behind me with his math tutor. My daughter at the lake for a play rehearsal. The poppies presumably still bobbing out front.

There is a lilac back here in almost complete shade. The leaves seem black. But clouds in the sky beyond it and the taller walnut tree are edged with gold like something out of a painting by Titian.

Since you asked: a mix of Idles and Roxy Music, Lou Reed and now Sleaford Mods. I feel so wrong…

A climbing hydrangea off to my left is pure science fiction, a page from a Wyndham novel, and yet just beyond it are good neighbours with a new baby.

I ran into my parents at a garden centre. They were uncomfortable and my father couldn’t hold my gaze. The oddest thing and I’ve no idea why.

Radiohead’s Hail To The Thief is their finest album, I reckon.

There is a red slackline ratcheted tight between the maple and a cedar post and I cannot make it from one end to the other. Not even close. “Bloodline” is a word that comes randomly to mind. 

Will the next novel be worth reading? Is it worth writing?

I am grinding my teeth. Have been doing it for years. An enamel paste likely collects under my tongue. 

The remains of a factory that made thermometers a century ago was just discovered below a neighbourhood in Manhattan. The ground is awash in lead.  

A whale washed ashore in the St. Lawrence. 

A woman wanting an abortion is hunted by the police.

The sun is lower in the sky now. The cedar fence boards are horizontal, like bodies piled up. 

A bird at rest in the tree becomes a sadness in the air.