Shush

A friend once said that words wear down life's magic with their insistence upon trying to capture and contain a moment. Yes, he said it outloud, but then after that, practically nothing for months. One time we walked several miles at night in the woods behind his cabin without an exclamation, or even a mumble, from his lips. No uncomfortable whistling either. But every once in a while he'd stop and listen. Mostly frogs and crickets. Then he'd look up towards the moon, stars and God and grin like a "motherfucker," a phrase he liked to say quite often when he still talked. Maybe all his silence really had to do with the fact that his wife was cheating on him with some rich doctor with nice teeth, while his were coming undone. Could be. The following summer, when they found him dead on the bathroom floor, his four-year-old son was trying to feed him a peanut butter sandwich, his mouth a sealed tomb of his final thoughts on the whole mess.

cool evening mist---

the neighbor's dog

barks at nothing