… he sits feeling the warmth of the spring breeze. A chaos of midgies hover near the edge; some are caught in a cobweb as mallards float along, birds hidden in the trees make themselves known and little buds begin their openings.

All these goings on are disturbed by the noise of a chugging barge churning the silt. A magpie swoops to the other bank to peck at something in the grass and there a moorhen comes out from the dark overhang. The magpie does a little dance and is gone as a another barge comes along in the wake of those returning mallards.

It’s quiet now but for nature’s song. The magpie returns with its mate pecking and tugging with hungry abandon, and there they’re off to the trees.

He sits trying with all his will to feel to engage with all this beauty but of course he fails. He’s not a part of this, he’s merely an observer and this saddens him …

~