Sunday morning

I am in my favorite place, one of them at least.

I am sitting in my little wooden chair, at my study room desk, looking out over the freshly mowed lawn into the woods beyond. The dandelions are daunted for a day and I can pretend that I have a real lawn, not a tapestry of weeds.

The apple trees have leafed out but a few clumps of white blossoms linger like leftover snow. The smooth bark of the big beech in the corner is now veiled behind the season's new growth.

Some bird is perched in the fig tree. A wasp is giving himself a concussion against the window pane. No sign of the resident chipmunk or ravenous, garden-ravaging rabbit yet today.

I almost wish I wasn't committed to go to church this morning but I owe a debt to the sacred.