Whether it’s because I’m in a transition week (holiday bod to word hero) or because my neighbours were given the gift of noise over Christmas, I decide to head out into the shimmering cold and give my lobes an airing. The sky is blue — a first for the week — and all the monkeys brass.
On my way to river, I pass the Reaching Tree. For decades, it’s striven southwards, poised to heft or catch something. Must be big, judging by the girthy limbs. A donkey, perhaps, or philosophical thought.
Across the path watches a painted eye, the curious city. Course, nature’s having none of it — it’s sliding a finger of ivy over the pupil. Concrete can’t keep secrets, you see. Not like wood. Don’t trust it.
Talking of trust, when I reach the river I see the local ufologists were right: flying saucers have been night fishing in the Elster. Dotted over the surface of snow and ice are perfect circles where the spacecraft hovered. They’re small, mind, but we shouldn’t compare inseams with every creature we encounter. These can, after all, cross galaxies. Little folk with big ambitions(*).
A young woman throws sticks onto the ice, making it chirp and chirrup like a bird. I heard this for the first time the other week whilst out with The Mathematician.
“It’s just the kids by the pond,” she’d said. “They’re making the noise.”
“With toys?”
“Toys, themselves. You know what kids are like.”
But no, it was the stones they were throwing striking the ice. The rivers and ponds are winter water drums, instrumets that mimic the birds in the trees above. It really is a magical sound and seems to delight all who hear it.
I come across a column of crows walking the path to the flower garden. At the head are a father and daughter scattering seed. The air’s filled with caws. One bird flies so close I hear its feathers sing.
I make my way north to the fairy gate, two trees on the hill to the music quarter whose limbs you have touch as you pass through. (I mean, you don’t have to, but why settle for a mundane life?) Atop the hill were once a bike and fallen branch on neighbouring benches. They’re gone now. No one can sit and talk forever.
—
The next day’s not so sunny but have legs, will travel, so I do. I take glass to the bottle bank and walk a little on the wasteland. I hear geese in the distance and look up to see three giants Vs heading south. I wonder whether, used to mild winters, they’ve changed their minds in this cold snap and broken camp. Great Tits comment on their passing. Comment on everything. Their voices are clear water for muddy thoughts.
It begins to snow. Giants flakes! What a great time to be out! Soon my hat and coat are full. I’ve white lashes and the taste of cloud in my mouth. (I hadn’t intended to eat the flakes, but the wind was blowing against me and grinning makes gaps.)
I’m reluctant to go back inside, so double back and head north. By a few slippery cobbles I see a ball of dark yarn. It’s unravelling. A thread snakes down the street for several metres through the snow. I wonder whose it was. Maybe the kerb is learning crochet …
I swing by the café to give and receive gifts. (Sehnsucht likes a Chilean red.) Being inside though makes me long for sky. I quit the place for home after a while and eat some lunch. The sun comes out to taunt me. We hoover the flat together and are content.
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(*) In contrast to giants, who are often content to sit idly in their dells, only venturing out on occasion to eat a village.
