In The Place Of The Birds

I went to the place where the birds go.

I stood on the ground and looked up into the treetops, now bare, twisting and thinning into sky. That’s where they perch, that’s where I see them land when sitting under the apple tree and spreading manure.

In those tree tops, they look so far away, they’re so small, I can’t even tell what kind of bird they are.

Yet here I am in the place of the birds, looking back at the farm.

The donkeys are in the pasture, standing there, looking at me.  Maybe they are wondering why I’m on the other side of the fence. Why I’m on the path where the deer, rabbits, cat and maybe even the bear walk.

All the years I’ve lived here and I’ve never stepped through the fence and into the place where the birds go.

The long thorny arms of the rosa multiflora and blackberries try to stop me, they grab onto my sweatshirt, stick on my pants. Or maybe they are holding me the only way they know how.

And when they do, the sun, which was coming and going all day long, stayed with us.  It lit up the yellow leaves making them glow.  It glistened the moisture pooled in a leaf from the afternoon rain.

I could only go so far, the bushes were too thick, but I feel like know the place a little better.  And that it welcomed me even if just for a little while.