The grass seed farmers have started cutting their fields. The summer scent of drying grass is intense this morning, like childhood and death in one divine breath. The streets were so quiet during my run at four-thirty, it seemed the houses were all empty. I wonder how many times the world has ended today; I wonder how many times it will begin. While I was watering the hanging basket, the […]
Coinciding with the arrival of this year’s first hot weather, the grass seed fields are in bloom. The pollen is nigh overwhelming. It’s as if paradise, suddenly aware of herself, has put on too much perfume. She goes to her first dance, where she meets the boy of her dreams. And he’s wearing too much cologne. Everyone in the school cafeteria is sneezing. The band plays on. Later, at home, […]
If I were to walk two hours in the heat, carrying my canvases through wild blackberries into the heart of the grass seed fields, and spend the day painting while hunger gnaws at my bones, and then come home exhausted with no means for my bills, and if you found me here, sitting on my only chair, ministered by angels and haunted by ghosts, what would you say to me? […]
Rain, enough to thrill the garden, but not to silence the scent of the grass seed fields. The delicate maples, red and green. The same towhee, in the same tree, sure each sentence must end differently. Flicker with an earth-brown beak, probing, searching, finding, swallowing. Little boy with a wet new bike, testing its frame against the curb, feeling the vibration in his bones. Funny how some words end up […]
It’s easy to think nature is subdued in cities and towns. But turn your head for just a moment and the pavement is cracked and the cracks are full of weeds. Walk through any neighborhood a time or two and you begin to see wood fences rotting, metal ones rusting, house siding softening, paint peeling, and rooftops covered with fir needles and moss — at least such is the case […]
When the all-pervasive scent from the grass seed fields enters the house, it is transformed into a ghost. For instance, if you visit a particular room in search of needle and thread, as soon as you enter you are sure you are not alone, or that someone was there before you and is about to return. I say transformed, but how, and by what? Does it work the magic itself, […]
William Michaelian 