All night the wind rattled the windows and the trees, branches scraped the house and each other, the rushing sound of it through the stiff leaves sounded like the restless bay, combining to make a storm of sound the whole night. Every time I woke the wind still shook the trees, and I would lie there an listen, feeling as restless as that wind. I thought it might die down with the sunrise but it has not, everything still in motion and the light and shadows across the yard an intricate dance of patterns.
The cat has come and gone, several times, as restless as the wind. The neighbor's black dog raced around sniffing enthusiastically, leaves blowing up in his face causing him to sneeze. I could see his head shake several times, and he ignores the cat who equally ignores him, the cat sitting near the water bowl, the dog out by the shed. Now he is gone, across the road and down the ditch, his tail switching behind him. Perhaps the wind makes him feel more wild, but the striped cat just wants to hunker down and find a sunny spot. Two blue jays have been silently chasing each other through the crepe myrtle then out into the maple, quiet and intent, unusual for those bird who are usually so noisy. Several of the little wrens have flown past but they did not stop, they're like little arrows of feathers. The cat now is sitting in the sun in the middle of the yard, washing its paws and shoulders, the wind fluffing it up, its tail curling at the end patting the grass. Suddenly, it has the burning desire to be in another spot, leaping up and racing toward the house. You never know what moves a cat!
This morning's poem is an old one, by Robert Louis Stevenson. I like it because our yard does not seem like it belongs only to us. I'm sure the cat and even the neighbor's dog think they have a stake in it, as do the squirrels and the pair of blue jays and the pair of cardinals that every year fight over nesting in the bushes. Even the guys who come to do the yard must feel in some way that it belongs to them as well, though they usually quit coming by the end of this month when everything has stopped growing, even the weeds.
My House, I Say
My house, I say. But hark to the sunny doves
That make my roof the arena of their loves,
That gyre about the gable all day long
And fill the chimneys with their murmurous song:
Our house, they say; and mine, the cat declares
And spreads his golden fleece upon the chairs;
And mine the dog, and rises stiff with wrath
If any alien foot profane the path.
So, too, the buck that trimmed my terraces,
Our whilom gardener, called the garden his;
Who now, deposed, surveys my plain abode
And his late kingdom, only from the road.
Robert Louis Stevenson
We, too, have doves, but I have not heard them in several mornings. Once, when I looked out I saw about a dozen mourning doves on the driveway, strange to have so many when I usually only see one or two at a time and can go for weeks without seeing any. I hear them more often than see them, their gentle owl-like who-who-whoing sometimes barely heard. The hard blank blue from earlier this morning is being softened by thin layers of gauzy clouds, thicker at the horizon, but thin as summer curtains overhead. The sounds of the morning, the news, the trash being assembled for taking out, the daughter getting coffee, are all going on behind me as I sit and make my own sound of tapping out words. Time to get busy, empty the refrigerator for market day, and other homely chores. For all the people and creatures that could lay claim to this house and yard, probably no one is happier about being here than I am, here at my window, taking it all in every morning.
This morning I found a new blog for word and photo and puzzle lovers, just the thing to wake up your brain!
http://compoundwordproject.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-background.html Have fun!
No comments:
Post a Comment