"We shape clay into a pot, but it is the emptiness
inside that holds whatever we want."
Tao Te Ching
Alone on a crowded bus. I sit pressed against the cold glass. Trees flash by. The thick fog deadens colour. The white noise of the highway howls, drowning out all sounds; conversations, a child crying, music from the headphones of the girl across the aisle, all fade to the backdrop of the highway. Outside the ghost grey trees slide past. The trees thin out; the fog follows the trees away, replaced by endless fields. Barren fields left ploughed through winter and now fallow as the sun creeps higher and the days get longer again. Fields left lifeless for the long dull hot months ahead. The green of the grass verge, the last colour before the distant horizon.
I’m driving fast. I watch cars, trucks, towns and cities flash past. The needle hits 80, I let it rest there. As I study the slower traffic, a dark spot in the sky catches my eye. Motionless on the breeze, stationary against the flood tide of humanity, a Kestrel hovers, hunting. Then I am past, the bird gone.
The hospital room surrounds me. The stark green-white walls. The freshly changed bedding. It is hostile. It is unwelcoming. In the bed my grandfather lies. Looking older than I have ever seen him. Older than I could ever imagine him looking. Boundless energy lost now to the ravages of drugs and disease. Energy drained by too much death. I turn away. Out the window, brown ploughed fields roll away to grey-green woods and a church tower peering over the trees far off in the distance. A dark spot against the sky catches my eye; a Kestrel hovers in middle distance, over its prey. I call attention to it. No one seems to hear. I press my hands against the cold glass. The old man behind me lying on the bed talking slowly, I do not hear his words. I focus my attention on the bird, its outstretched wings flick slightly as it faces into the wind, hovering over its prey, the vivid red of its topside against the stark white underbelly, reflecting the hospital walls around me. The grey head with black tears rolling down its cheeks, crying for all the grief in this room, and all the other windows of death looking out on him, hunting. Past the bird, life in those distant villages goes on as it has done for countless years, those we love flourish and fade. Everything is changing.
I feel the glass drawing heat from my face. I sit up slowly, rubbing warmth back into my cheek. We are in a town. Children playing outside houses, shops with people coming and going, a garage with cars on ramps, a convenience store, a sweet shop, fire station. I watch the foreign world go past. I do not know the people I see. I do not recognize the cars that pass. I know nothing of this small town. Of this foreign land I journey through, oblivious to the way of life that I see around me. I am isolated from the people and land I travel through, having left all I knew as it died around me. I lean back on the window as we pass a school.
I look down at the small, threadbare bag next to worn old leather boots between my bare feet. Life stripped to the minimum, I travel light carrying all, I own. I have nothing and no one to hold me down. Travelling off the money left to me by those now dead and gone, waiting, maybe, in some next world. The bus passes over a river. A small group of canoes move slowly down stream, enjoying the countryside and sun as I used to a few short years before, in a different life. I watch them for a long moment as we continue fast along the highway.
I am kneeling. I push the paddle gently outwards, my canoe comes around in a long slow turn in the back of the canoe, so I can drift side on downstream. I watch my companions paddle, studying their technique. A heron flies over head, long legs trailing; neck thrown back into a gentle S, grey wings slowly beat. In flight it is as serene, as elegant as when it is motionless, hunting. Large families of swans drift slowly into view and away as we pass. Slowly, all eternity moves, slowly. I relax. Turn the canoe downstream. My mind focuses on concentrating on my technique, in, pull, turn the paddle, push back forwards; in, pull push back; in, pull, twist, push back. Repeating to the distant rest stop, repeat through the dull ache of shoulders and arms, through the numbness of knees on the deck, legs curled up under the seat. The quiet empty farm land floats around us. I stand up to watch fields of cattle, acres of green corn, miles of sun-bright yellow oilseed rape and the startling red of poppies. They pass, ever slowly, in the serenity of a slow running river. We paddle on. I am free from life for two hours of my week. Two hours. Such freedom.
Living from day-to-day in the frenetic activity of Life I tried to settle into the pace, to find my feet. It was wrong. Without her there I had less to say. I looked for something, anything that I felt complete with, anything to hold on to. To find something to do, something to make, or sing, or read. But it was not here. Not in the sweeping speed of life. So, with nothing more than the nothing around me that was my own I packed a bag one autumn day and shouldered my way through commuters and kicked through the gathering leaves to the bus stop. Stepped out into the world to find where I should be, what I should do. Everything is changing.
Here I sit, cheek pressed hard against the window. The sun falling slowly ahead of us, lighting the sky with a myriad of reds and oranges as it dies, fading through purple to its deepest of blues. My hand runs down the bare armrest, the coarse backing pulls and tugs at my worn fingertips. The headrest in front is a sad grey reminder of a once lively pattern. I pull my travel clock from my bag, the pocket lying limply open. It sits small in my hand. I open it up like a small book. The display flashes slowly on the right of the hinge. On the left is a picture frame, tired old faded pictures with the colours running gaze out blankly. I hit the ‘mode’ button mindlessly. I set it to countdown the 86,400 seconds of the day as they elapse, each one gone forever as it falls away, lost to the mists of memory, lost like tears in the rain. I thumb the clock closed and replace it in my bag. I look back toward the canoeists on the river lost long behind us, as the last remaining light fails and the night is complete. I close my eyes to drift downstream with them.
Part 3 is due for release tomorrow.
Thank you for visiting.
All stories and works in their complete form are available in the bookstore, to visit click here.
Thank you for visiting.
All stories and works in their complete form are available in the bookstore, to visit click here.