Anymore, Anymore

The leaves on the Japanese maple out front didn’t follow their usual pattern of slow change, maroon presentation, dessicated dangling, lazy drift downward. Maybe it was the late summer drought, maybe it was the grief in the air around the farm, maybe it was something hidden from me. I went out this afternoon to take advantage of the warm (51F) day and do a bit of pruning, and I noticed that the leaves on that tree were curled and shrunken, like ashes on stems, like sour memories, like unwelcome reminders.

I cut back the peonies and pruned the base of the crape myrtle. I sawed off a few low, useless branches on the weeping willow. I snipped off the sedum and cleaned out the two fountains, then scrubbed the birdbath with a handful of pine straw and refilled it with fresh water. The sun, so hateful on a Sunday afternoon, was a volley of slanting amber arrows from the clear west, sinking into me, striking at my soft parts.

I was wearing the new boots my wife bought me, cushioned and luxurious. I was silver-haired in the sun, pockmarked and devious, gleaming with grief, brimming with the hatred I’m saving for tomorrow morning. My shadow was as long as a farm-to-market road, as gray as dishwater. It seems I’m fading. I wonder if I am.

~ S. K Orr