A Poet's Journal: September 15th, 2013

September 15th, 2013

I missed a chance to go berry-picking last week, yet determination is ever eager for the future, and by next week's sunrise, I believe my hopes will have found a habitation for their movements.  It is almost too pleasing to know why I haven't gone, for being so disappointed in my last outing, I prefer the harvest of former years, and tell myself my gatherings have never been the same since nor will be, and so my perfect contentment to see the berries grow and die in the most inharmonious way.  Yet this has not left me in the least way paralyzed, for I have moved on to mushrooms, finding a few bolets and girolles, and instead of feeling the growth of a season fading away, have turned inward, to the distant pages of quiet thoughts, and speak to myself in a manner that is only pleasing to the barren field or solitary listener.  And yet, were these to offer any sort of reward, they in themselves would lose their flavor, and the cycle of life be but a mis-step into a bush of thorns.

Douglas Thornton