It was before nine o’clock in the morning on the back porch of the house. The fall sun had abandoned
the Newnan man. On the table lay a folded newspaper, the word
‘prefix’ standing out in six tiny boxes. A half-gone box of Pall Mall Blue
100’s told of thinking and speaking-each sewn within the anesthetic comfort of
habit.
A blue haze tinted the timeless scene of lake and trees that
sang before me. A somber song, the leaves of the mighty evergreens bellowed at
the coming Night. More truth confronted by trees than by men. The crippling
shadow of beauty.
I was struck by three Blue Jays, peculiar in their mirth. Refusing
to let the funerary cadence stand, they went on gathering their food.
