Today, soft rain. The book I finished last night was damp with sea air, every page strewn with kelp, bladderwrack. Once, when I woke to let the cat out, I heard a coyote singing so far away it was almost an echo. Nothing interrupted. Let me be so attentive. Let me put my head down on the pillow and complete the song. The other day I almost walked by the small green body huddled below the cherry tree. Almost. But something made me turn and lift the tiny tree frog, cupping my hands together to make a basket. The cherry will not bloom for weeks.
In the greenhouse, the St. Brigid anemones are coming into flower. One of them opened as I settled the frog in a pot of last year’s salad greens.
Let me be so attentive that I see each bud, each bloom, each tiny frog in the brown winter grass. At dinner the other night, under a lamp of circling planets, my son leaned forward and there were silver strands in his dark hair.
...Theresa Kishkan 