Commotion In the Still

As they say, silence can sometimes speak loud. Perhaps you’ve overheard me. There’s a lot of noise going on in my head these days and it sounds cacophonous until I try to make music of it on this page.

I’m hearing sounds of dread and hurt mingled with Peggy’s sing-along of her favorite Irish singers.  A violin of flutter-byes. A ditty, a hymn and a dirge. An oboe of woe. Then a ditty again. Clarinets rising. Baritone sax descending. An orchestration that could be life itself in its phases.

Along with the choreography of wind swaying the leaves there is calligraphy in the bent branch reaching for a slice of sun. There goes a petal falling that is not a metaphor.

It is now 6:40 A.M. Peggy has taken her morning doses. The four tablets are racing to their assignment. There is a stillness outside the window. Yet I sense a commotion in the still-life. Yesterday there was a squirrel desperate for a dram of morning dew. Survival is a daily matter as the hummingbird beats with a frenzy just to remain motionless.

Increments of green from forest to near-yellow and every stop between. So much we don’t see until now. Later there will be exaltations of serenity in her eyes as if some sublime alignment. She may call for her notebook. There is a Thursday in every week at least once, maybe more.

I am here at her bedside. I want to feel with her. I am privileged to have been summoned and to answer the call. Hers is a life lived. The air is charged and I bear witness.