The morning rain beads and pools on the newly sealed deck. Drops hang from the table edge reflecting the silver light of an overcast sky. In my head, a song plays. I switch up the lyrics to make them about sitting, waiting, and watching the rain. Have patience, everything will be alright.

The jagged line of butter rises like bas relief sculpture on the knife – yellowing whitecaps approaching a flat and silvery shore. The fork waits like an open hand begging – its small claw tines looking for something to scoop, poke, or shovel – anticipating a gaping mouth not knowing the work is done.

One crow soars away, its five-beat caw receding.  The sun is lower on the horizon compared to a month ago. This is us turning away from the light. A second crow flies away, flapping towards white clouds in the blue distance. A pencil drawing of birds – two humps, curvy v, incomplete m.

The neighbor carrying a baseball bat and walking her elderly dog stops across the street from us. “Did you hear about Bernie?” I don’t know Bernie. The white terrier – Justin’s dog… ahhh, Bernie.  A pit bull on Suburban broke loose and killed him. I have a pit bull. I understand the looks.

With the windows and doors closed and the morning dark, nothing grabs me: no birds, no wind, no swirl of cloud or peek-a-boo light. With no focus, the words stay hidden – difficult to extract. Twenty-four, then thirty-four, I’m tugging and pulling them to fifty-two. Clementines, two bags of chips, blue ceramic bowl.

The two-arm propeller red pinwheel spins counterclockwise on the map. Red zones and red cones – warnings and watches. Plywood windows, windy palms, now the waiting begins. Here the late afternoon skies were clear with a quick sun shower and a double rainbow.  The clouds were mountain big and rimmed in gold.

At the edge of the dining room table, between the aloe plant splayed like an upside down octopus and the tangled Pothos, sit seven objects grouped together: mug with paint brushes and pens, wallet with credit card on top, key fob, squeaker, sunglasses, earbud case, house keys – a still life, my life.

The morning colors! The morning colors! The morning colors! A blue so clear and light – oranges so vibrant that the word feels too flat and singular – maybe it’s all the fruit (peaches, oranges, tangerines). Clouds roiled with grays.  And later: whites, golds, yellows, and silver. The morning colors! The morning colors!

It was dark. Now it’s pale and light. My fingers sting from the cold air walk. Jacket weather – this again. The dog shakes a spindly toy squeaky chicken with long and crinkly legs. His play is violence. A reminder that in the calm of dawn, somewhere, something is being torn apart.

Rain. The wind isn’t strong. It blows and rustles enough to be heard. This is the first day of fall. Autumnal equinox – two words that sound better when one pays attention to the syllables or lingers in the half-light / half-dark space between them… words falling and tumbling like the morning wind.