Carpinteria, CA: August Afternoon in Avacado Grove Seals on rocks. The paperwhites bloom. Dog rests on her haunches and giant bubbles escape into the warm air. This is a day of rest. Fullness. Little rest. Perhaps wicked, at least le plus mechant. Such small mercies, the redemptive pattern of flitting cabbage whites, fragile wings whispering on the rise someplace else. We dig and we dig, in search of treasure, or some other torment. This is the measure, the spoons laid out, the cups washed and waiting. Black widow webs embellish forgotten corners of the property, the haphazardness of the weave a dead giveaway for the locations of ink-skinned demons. Sun tries to break through, a fragmentary look at a summer promised. All greens are not the same-the blood orange leaf and the stag's head fern-shaped and tinted in some maker's guileless hands. Long-handled secateurs, a pair of hurricane lanterns redundant, a small brown frog creeping through the undergrowth. Haze slumps over the foothills this afternoon, red-tailed hawks hidden from view, their sharp metallic cries audible across the busy road. A small boy builds a house for roly-polies, his hesitant steps familiar, yet unknown. Dim the lights and cover the birds for the evening. Tomorrow's another day. Chamomile-East of the Indies. Splash from a splintered bow, the waves cresting as a downcast moon slumps below the far line. Divinity splays itself out, arms and legs akimbo, wretched battles with a frequent transgressor amounts to little, or nothing. If you said, widdershins, I stopped myself from replying. What point was there to it, anyway? Depth-the perception of something more than what actually exists, the percussive versus the regressive. A limb caught in a vice, the splintering of the tibia, tooth-picked. The writing is no good, the hallucination of a state of awareness that might not help in the long run. Sitting could make a difference, the posture corrected, the spine straightened. Limp away to a corner and enshrouded yourself. With the ricocheting of stone on stone, wood on water, a curled set of letters, emptied graves, a woodshed set back from the road. Three calico cats shunted their fur against the siding, burgundy eyes diamonding the lease line. Always the memory of angry words, curses on linoleum floors, the harsh tone as bitter as licking a halved lemon. Everything stilled in the lee of the mountain. © James Claffey