walks

Our neurons fire

things I noticed

A shift in mind as I round the first bend to the park. Calming, slowing. Drop irritation behind me. I heard yesterday that our neurons fire in cycles of two beats per second, a hundred and twenty cycles per minute, and that these cycles can be influenced by faster or slower music. Walking to a slower beat, do I slow my manic neurons?

Coming again to a point of noticing gives pleasure, like a tonic note or a good joke. Half anticipation, half surprise, familiar. Let me pepper my walks with points of closely seen.

Sharp little buds again, but here another form – a vine wrapped over and around in loving tangle. Sharp-budded tree bent double, domed. Doomed? this amourous pair will grow together or perish, one or the other. But look, the promiscuous vine reaches already for another, the next tree over. This one will always land on its feet.

The forest is full of such romances.

Here, on the lee side, honeysuckle bear bundles of leaves already. Already, redheaded tufts beard the maples. Not long, now, to blossom. What will they do when the snow comes? Late snow in spring this year, again.

Over the bridge and up, steps to the library roof. The Christmas spruce is gone at last; only rust and needles left.

Walking back on the paved straight path, I close my eyes to head my beat, my breathing. Notice my head’s faint weaving, which I’ve never caught before.

Primaries subdued

things I noticed

Younger woman in sunglasses and sweats, on the same path I am. Body plump as young bodies are plump: fresh, inviting. Does she understand what beauty of youth she carries? See how she struts; she knows.

Small grey curly thing with a paw lifted, face tilted. Mid-day, the little dogs come out.

Music, from where? A space between walkers. Sound ebbs and rushes with the wind, “All is quiet on New Year’s Day.” Really, Bono? Do you think so? Early this morning you’d have been right. Now la monde is outside.

Young ones scramble over rocks after a lost ball.

Brushed gold grasses, rusty sumac, lake a deep blue under this sky. The primaries subdued; how pleasing. Flutter of fallen leaves, this mischievous wind, and a child named Bianca. White, in the midst of it all.

Where there were sage green buds: new leaves. Branches that rattled now rustle. Run of green up a stalk: a trill.

Oh, young man in a muscle car, you’re not half such a thrill.

Temptation to braid these reeds on the forest’s edge. I was here.

Smell of sap rising. Buds bead the tips of twigs, buds as sharp as little milk teeth.

Across a small bridge over a brook, sight of a blue-headed mallard wading upstream. Not that there is much stream to contend with. More, it’s the broken trees that block his way. He waddles gamely over logs and under arches, his bill so bright, so sudden, it looks painted on or plastic.

I notice I’ve lost my pen.

A small family bent in the wood, gathering. What, I ask. Mother calls to son, son calls to grandson, grandson explains: plants to to rub on skin, to heal the hands. Broken French on both sides, we smile and touch and gesture. May I take a picture? Image comes to focus, shutter clicks, and I hand back the healing. Small family walks on, under waking trees under noon sun.

Question mark neck

things I noticed

Aging skater boy, leaning back on his board in the curve.

And what are these? Baby magnolia? Cheerful as daisies, they try and try.

In this heat, the children emerge on bikes and on blankets. Pushed in strollers and carried in their parents’ arms.

Another dead squirrel where I saw one at the equinox. The first was thin and frozen, this one fat and lustrous. Spring progresses.

The goose brigade is out. What’s this fellow doing, solo in the cul de sac of the lake? Green, gentle water; he sips and he honks. Teenagers at the wall honk back at him.

Heron with a fish in its mouth, swallowing. He stabs and stabs, and down the gullet it goes at last. Old man heron with his question mark neck.

Worms have bellies

things I noticed

Worms on the path after rain. One little one, prehensile head searching, stretching.

It is translucent, almost, body pink and peach and bruise coloured toward the tail. A band around its belt, quite orange. Nubbins on its belly. Worms have bellies?

Across a bridge and down a red brick walk I find myself at the centre of a court ringed round with houses. Houses linked elbow to elbow; all their eyes are windows focused inward toward me, the intruder at the centre.

Here a sleeping fountain flaunts its works.

A fine rain falls. Scent of water in the air, which is not the odour of wet earth. Pale blue electric scent: scratched metal, fork against teeth.

Tying knots in the wind

things I noticed

Lop-eared pines.

Two finches tangle, bound together by a filament of air, tying knots in the wind.

New growth clatters under my glove, springs. Silver branches shimmer before a white sun.

Weight of a thought on my tongue.

On a path to the forest, wood chips rattle. Here, on the outside, brittle.

This part of the wood where the dead trees are. Bracken rises. Listen. The old ones creak. The water seeps. Wetland covers the forest floor, blackish. Rises. Listen.

Ebb and flow of rhythm. The colour of the music.

Motion in space with the music. Not dancing; crouching. How my arms wield paint, syringe.

The essential curve

things I noticed

Clumsy fingers. Cold hands. My wrists still numb when I write.

Grasses in the marsh, light gold with an undercoat of steel. Blond fur on the earth. This morning, no red in the grass, no blue in the water. The sky is white overhead.

A gull flies away from me, chased by the wind. Slopes with the wind. At certain angles, when its wings are parallel to my vision, nothing appears but a dot that is its body. Then it flies behind a cloud and the dot is no more.

Shoulder high grass, a finer kind. Run my hand along the top of it: wiry and thin as horse’s tail.

Lower your eye level.

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Walking fast into gusts

things I noticed

A woman in yellow, dancing. Her narrow hands, dancing. Her eyes, dancing. Her calves and her toes, dancing. Each part of her body participant in motion, then still. Anticipation. Restraint. Calm before a storm-burst, her euphoria.

Six women, dancing. The strength and grace of archers. Purpose in their eyes and in the weight of their heads, held back on delicate necks. Warriors. Weight shifts forward to bent knees; hold. Spring back, hind legs ready to receive. Hold. Turn, together. Intention in their wrists and in their ankles, grace in their power, power in their poise.

A feeling of yearning: a pull, a pulse, a flutter.

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Birds buffeted by the wind

things I noticed

Birds buffeted by the wind

A blackbird on a yellow reed, bent down by the bird’s weight. The bird had a red dash on its shoulder and was larger than I expected it to be.

A man running with a boy on a bike. The boy was small and wore a helmet ridged with green dragon scales down the center. The man had fleshy lips and curly black hair, going grey. On the down slopes the boy pulled ahead while the man sprinted to keep up. On the uphills, he gained on the boy. Up hill and down, slower and faster, they wove their way along the path ahead of me until I lost sight of them.

Nibs of tender new grass, turning the forest floor bright green where the sun shines.

Parents running with their children. At first it was rare and mostly with teenagers, but there are eight- and nine-year-olds jogging like any seasoned runner now that the days are fine.

In the right light, the reeds around the marshes look red.