The Pond at Dusk

A fly wounds the water but the wound soon heals. Swallows tilt and twitter overhead, dropping now and then toward the outward-radiating evidence of food. The green haze on the trees changes into leaves, and what looks like smoke floating over the neighbor’s barn is only apple blossoms. But sometimes what looks like disaster is disaster: the day comes at last, and the men struggle with the casket just clearing the pews.