Writing is not hard–spelling, grammar, syntax, commas– not hard. Paying attention is hard. Being fully aware of how many leaves were yesterday green and are today yellow. It’s exhausting. This bearing witness to–for–the world.

I set my machines a-go—lit-bot, Roomba, dishwasher—before I leave to walk the manmade trails among these invasive vines.

Fall arrived on a sneeze last Tuesday. Blue sky. Yellow Sun. Cool breeze. And the hint of burn on the leaves.

“Are you wearing rose-tinted glasses?” “Yes. I am. I paid good money for these, for the end of the world.”

our children are all bruised fruit. We, as mothers, yearn to remove their skin to wear–to love– them ripe again. Licensable1,124 Bruised Fruit Stock Photos …istockphoto.com Under the unsightly exterior, bruised fruit might contain better nutrition – Michigan Gardener

Why is that so ludicrous? Is it harder to imagine him as her or to credit his genius as anonymous?

We pay them to sacrifice their teeth to a made-up fairy. Whose belief are we buying? What’s that even about?

A bag of baby  teeth, a button, a pack  of shoe laces, a Sousa medal, and a black ball cap

Amelie, a wagging beagle, the smell of hot horse and dry grass— gray sky tucked around me like damp cotton