beneath the birches, waiting.
In Spring
E ARLY IN THE MORNING , before it gets light, the snow ploughs circle the block. With a dull scraping noise they dig out broad paths along the pavements, and nothing gives a deeper sense of restfulness and warmth than listening to snow being cleared as, half awake, I turn over and go back to sleep. Sometimes I lie crossways in my big bed and sometimes diagonally. I like having plenty of space.
More and more snow cascades down in the darkness and is just as steadily scraped away. During the day, fog rolls in from the sea. We’ve had snow-fog for a very long time now and have walked around in twilight.
Last night there was thunder, probably thunder, a couple of powerful crashes, not a rumble, but more like tremors that went right down through the building. In the morning, the sky was completely clear, filled with a hard, exuberant light, and later that day the snow began to melt. There was a continuous shifting and changing outdoors, snow tumbling from the buildings in great white clutches, water clattering on metal roofs, meltwater streaming, andthe whole time that powerful, challenging light. I went out on the street. The sound of rushing water was almost violent, babbling and flooding across the pavement and the street amid the thudding of the falling snow.
In this naked light, all of winter’s traces are visible not least in a face. Everything becomes distinct and turns outwards, exposed, penetrated by the light. People come out of their holes. Perhaps they’ve survived the winter in flocks or maybe alone, willy-nilly, but now they appear and make their way to the harbour, the way they always do.
It was easier to walk past each other protected by cold and darkness. Now we stop and tell each other spring has come. I say, “Drop in sometime,” but I don’t mean it. And he says, “How are you doing?” without meaning anything special – I think. We are stuck with each other because we’re both on our way to the corner and there are no side streets.
So much water dripping and running, and how everything sparkles and dazzles! Now everything will start to grow again, all of it, all over again. Where does it get the energy? It’s just fantastic this business about always getting another chance, and I ask, “Are you with someone these days, or are you living alone?” “No,” he says matter-of-factly, “I’m not seeing anyone.” And I say that’s too bad, now it’s spring. So we exchange information that has a certain significance, if very little, and we part with our dignity intact. I walk on across the square, taking note of all the rushing and gushing. The water in the gutters is almost clean, and beyond the quay the sun is boring into the ice, which burns away in fine, needle-like formations.I’ve heard that it’s thunderstorms that break up the ice, but I don’t know why. I could call him. He could have kept me company down to the harbour. Or maybe not. There are big pools of meltwater where the storm sewers empty into the harbour, full of trash and plastic and all the filth and refuse of the city, bubbling and glittering in the sunshine, bobbing cheerfully against the harbour wall, though maybe some of it will drift out by and by and float away and big waves will take it in hand, maybe.
I drift along the shore that encloses the city where I live until I come to the last point of land, and there they are, all of them, the black winter people on this blindingly bright spring day. One by one, each of them separately, they sit on the steps on the hillside and turn their faces upwards, as stiff and solemn as birds. Maybe he should have come with me after all. They stand out on the docks, just stand there quite still, each one alone. The ice is quite dark. It looks soft and yielding. The entire landscape rests on a threshold or perhaps a wave, ready to glide over the top and make a decision. This is roughly my train of thought, hasty and confused. Then I decide to
In Spring
E ARLY IN THE MORNING , before it gets light, the snow ploughs circle the block. With a dull scraping noise they dig out broad paths along the pavements, and nothing gives a deeper sense of restfulness and warmth than listening to snow being cleared as, half awake, I turn over and go back to sleep. Sometimes I lie crossways in my big bed and sometimes diagonally. I like having plenty of space.
More and more snow cascades down in the darkness and is just as steadily scraped away. During the day, fog rolls in from the sea. We’ve had snow-fog for a very long time now and have walked around in twilight.
Last night there was thunder, probably thunder, a couple of powerful crashes, not a rumble, but more like tremors that went right down through the building. In the morning, the sky was completely clear, filled with a hard, exuberant light, and later that day the snow began to melt. There was a continuous shifting and changing outdoors, snow tumbling from the buildings in great white clutches, water clattering on metal roofs, meltwater streaming, andthe whole time that powerful, challenging light. I went out on the street. The sound of rushing water was almost violent, babbling and flooding across the pavement and the street amid the thudding of the falling snow.
In this naked light, all of winter’s traces are visible not least in a face. Everything becomes distinct and turns outwards, exposed, penetrated by the light. People come out of their holes. Perhaps they’ve survived the winter in flocks or maybe alone, willy-nilly, but now they appear and make their way to the harbour, the way they always do.
It was easier to walk past each other protected by cold and darkness. Now we stop and tell each other spring has come. I say, “Drop in sometime,” but I don’t mean it. And he says, “How are you doing?” without meaning anything special – I think. We are stuck with each other because we’re both on our way to the corner and there are no side streets.
So much water dripping and running, and how everything sparkles and dazzles! Now everything will start to grow again, all of it, all over again. Where does it get the energy? It’s just fantastic this business about always getting another chance, and I ask, “Are you with someone these days, or are you living alone?” “No,” he says matter-of-factly, “I’m not seeing anyone.” And I say that’s too bad, now it’s spring. So we exchange information that has a certain significance, if very little, and we part with our dignity intact. I walk on across the square, taking note of all the rushing and gushing. The water in the gutters is almost clean, and beyond the quay the sun is boring into the ice, which burns away in fine, needle-like formations.I’ve heard that it’s thunderstorms that break up the ice, but I don’t know why. I could call him. He could have kept me company down to the harbour. Or maybe not. There are big pools of meltwater where the storm sewers empty into the harbour, full of trash and plastic and all the filth and refuse of the city, bubbling and glittering in the sunshine, bobbing cheerfully against the harbour wall, though maybe some of it will drift out by and by and float away and big waves will take it in hand, maybe.
I drift along the shore that encloses the city where I live until I come to the last point of land, and there they are, all of them, the black winter people on this blindingly bright spring day. One by one, each of them separately, they sit on the steps on the hillside and turn their faces upwards, as stiff and solemn as birds. Maybe he should have come with me after all. They stand out on the docks, just stand there quite still, each one alone. The ice is quite dark. It looks soft and yielding. The entire landscape rests on a threshold or perhaps a wave, ready to glide over the top and make a decision. This is roughly my train of thought, hasty and confused. Then I decide to
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