Afternoon Dreams

Sitting quietly doing nothing, spring comes, and the grass grows by itself. (Zen proverb)

It is on days like this––when the storm seems to sit forever above the northwest horizon, far away and never breaking but dark enough to dirty the daylight; when the warm whispering breath of the breeze wants nothing more than to shout and become something bigger than we'd like; when the grass-clippings, newly mowed and damp from this morning's watering–– smelling sweet and lusty––like nothing more than to green our feet and catch between our toes, tickling each step we take––that there is nothing finer than to find a shaded spot beneath a birch on a gently sloping hillside and simply listen to the world be the world, to the cusp of the season struggle against the turning of the next, to rest your head against the soft rising and falling chest of your dog, and doze perhaps, if you see fit.

Ah, the bliss, when afternoons and afternoon dreams bleed so seamlessly together.