By: Brian Michael Barbeito

There was an ugly man beside me. I am heavily trained and practiced in anti-oppression frameworks. I was perhaps the star social service worker of my Provence, perhaps beyond. There is that, yes, but there is another sense you have to be honest about. I was ordering food and I noticed him. He was eerie also, and had a bad vibration. Otherwise, an ugly man can be the kindest of souls, and have learned more from the world. But not this one. He seemed to be full of darkness. I looked away and carried on. 

Later, I found a table, and I sanded it down a bit and painted it. I chose a kind of muted green hue, so pastel-like that it was almost grey. a small old jam jar I washed out and picked the tiny flowers I saw and put them there carefully in some water. I am afraid it is cold outside, especially in the nights, and I forget to bring them in. yet, I think everything is going to be okay. I sat there for two wicker chairs and cushioned seats make a nice place. my grandfather might like a wicker chair I thought for some reason. but he didn’t sit outside did he?- like in poems and stories the way it should be. that’s okay. I shall sit there for him. there is a bird that flies and calls in the night, by this I swear. yet, I don’t know who the bird is. a bird must see and know many things. a bird is free, emancipated from the ground and it’s troubles. 

I told the beloved, ‘It is colder than I thought, my love, and if the warmth is going to arrive, it is not today that this will happen. we shall have to be good and kind and appreciate our abode, our digs, our dwelling. we shall have to reside in and around our sanctuary until the world changes.’ 

when I was a boy a ghost visited me. the phantom wanted to talk. he looked to be my age. I became frightened and ran away. then he became frightened and literally flew away. I watched him from the other end of the hallway. much later spirit told me who he was. I looked it all up. he was a poet that lived by a lake, had an alcohol problem, but was a nice enough guy. he was the son of a more famous poet. 

I spoke to the world scholars. he had a love interest once but his tutors advised him that she was from a lower class and he unfortunately I say, listened to them instead of his heart. he died age 54 I think. the later spirit said that that spirit was me, myself. I don’t drink however, or very rarely. maybe I gave it up between lives. the scholars said that some people are re-examining his work because it is argued that it has more merit than originally given credit for. the story is true, yet it doesn’t make sense, even to me. how can you visit yourself as a ghost? who knows for sure? the night is long and strange for a lost soul, and the rain, Hartley, it hardly ever ends…

the sun. the rocks. the water distant. shimmering. what is there? tall tree. stoic. coloured leaves. pumpkins. a nice vessel. roots. steps. dwellings. the sun again. the sun sometimes sets into the water. ghostly. neon. slumbering. it has fallen. but slowly. the languid earth in autumn. fall is a promissory note for winter. paced. not prideful. but hopeful. for something. the green things. they change. liminal passageway to winter. it shall become cold. we know such. the birds know. the birds are gnostic. the flocks. a solitary hawk circled. glides. is. it is ‘isness.’ atmosphere. the sun. rock. water. it all glistens. what will become of us? the ones long ago were also in their prime once. far forgotten now. where are they? where are their souls? storms gather over lakes and in the skies. there is still a fire inside, a light. it sustains. I think once we skated upon ice in the electrical illumined night, no? in a dream I saved you and cautioned you. the sun though. it must have seen everything if you think about it. evolution. beauty. disaster. the building of civilizations. their fall. war. love. birth. death. souls together sanguine. souls apart saturnine. the northern nodes and southern skies, the western winds and eastern epochs and epiphanies and enlightenments. old wooden fences flaxen for the sun that run and stand across almost unknown fields full of wildflowers in the middle of summer bright and unwavering. ya the sun would have some stories to tell certainly, doncha think?

I had seen the ugly man again. I felt like he was a monster. Why such an intuition? Difficult to know. I somehow feel upset that I need to eat food in order to survive the same way he does. I tried to think of nicer things instead, memories.

I became borne from a troubled womb, a mystic womb, a mysterious womb in the far away night, literally. word was there was never such a storm in that town that borders all the other towns, and long since they say, has that hospital closed down. coyotes and some say, wolves, roamed the fields and forests, the valleys and farms beyond. how wretched, unfortunate, what a sadness some schools of thought declare, it is to be borne. but eventually providence smiled and the fates took us to the southern sun where the Bougainvillea trees grew on the sides of streets and soul mates seemed to wait and welcome us. we grew up with a silver spoon as the old saying goes, and could hear the sounds of pool pump motors near the sea, flocks of birds talking loquaciously. and what of it? I don’t know. the sanguine shore, the dreams to fruition, a pier that meets somehow the sun. electric eve. our books and poems, the long corridors in morning, shadow and light. ‘Look,’ said I, as dawn broke into the world, ‘no matter where you go here, on a good day or bad, they have palm trees just everywhere, and I know the sand path that leads to the sea, where on the sides, framing the area, those palm leaves wave at night in winds. yes they wave and talk to the moon.’ 

I remembered that there was once the sea, and your eyes and the music of the flocks and the wind and the crests of waves so wise and ancient and new. I went out there in the mornings and the world was empty save for sometimes a few yoga people or some old man with a metal detector looking for treasures. the air and light and scent of the flowers and pure preternatural dawn was like nothing else known. how cold and indifferent northern towns and cities compares to the southern shore paradise. and how mean and cruel and saturated w/judgement and drama all of their eyes, a million eyes, ten million eyes, all full of lies, but not not yours. why then, must the world spin? turn it back. please providence and fortune, turn it back just once. the sun on shirts is nothing upon paper, but if I could show you for a moment the warmth and light of the sun on a shirt, a railing, a promenade or parapet, on the palm leaf verdant or light pastel stucco wall pink or blue, you would surely say, ‘…ah, I understand…’ but it’s not to be. oh well. just forget about it. 

a boat in the night in the distance. we approach in time the Floridian coastline from the south. I have a shell from the sea, and a quiet memory. I have seen the tranquil temperate waters. many decades ago I played w/a toy boat and figures alone on the Atlantic coastline. I know the angel of place, wise and ancient, ever present and part of the divine. sure, people clink glasses and accrue worldly things and experiences. but I am always as I was, for a satori was borne to me many moons ago there. and inside of the night. inside of the night yes, where still the vessels strange and solitary traverse the horizon line distant. I am me. I am the child. I am the child of the southern coastline then and now and always. I am the progeny, chosen not by people but by the angel. I was born in the night, beyond orthodox hours, far, so very far in the night. I am the offspring of metaphysical light, it and I, a light in the night.

I see there are posters for a missing girl. nobody knows then where she is, what happened to her. I say a quiet inward prayer that she is brought home safely. she is a teenager. they don’t give much other information besides her name. 

I am sure she is loved and missed by her family. she has dark skin so I am I worry about whether the media and world will try as much to find her as someone else. 

I have been thinking of my grandparents lately. We watched game shows, eat soup, I play with toys and also draw pictures of soldiers in mountains having a war. Helicopters planes bullets. I sit on easy long couches and don’t talk. Daydream. And in the summers she makes homemade popsicles. We go to the fairgrounds a lot when it’s open. She crochets and also makes stew, pepper pot. Lots of prayer books around. Lives of the songs, Bible, talismans, rosary. Simple though. Or simplistic. Calm enough. A raspberry yard is in the backyard. Detached house. Dogs barking across the street. My uncle lives there. Gambler. He takes me to parks. And science centre. And later on the race track. Some kids bullied me and threw me down beside the street. I learned how the world really could be. So I retreated back home geographically and also spiritually, into myself. I have never really left myself since. Not really, even when it appears I might have. I like myself. I don’t like the world. sometimes there are birds loquacious and plentiful. that is nice, for such a thing as that is so much better than the world and it’s ambition and cleverness, it’s judgements and psychic and physical infrastructure. In my own worlds I can mix tenses and memories and even watch game shows. I am not interested in what occurs in them, just possibly looking for maybe some kind of Proustian moment as they say. therefore, I have to watch tv, have to make a point of watching more television. go figure. who woulda thunk? the sun shines through the window in the last, upon kitsch paintings of farms and rural scenes. it’s been a long journey from there to here. I have survived and will continue to, especially if I am supported by the fates, by providence, by certain karma and dharma. we will see. 

we crossed paths. a Christian pastor and I. there. he asked some question. we had the same first name. from somewhere in the Southern United States, I want to say Louisiana but can’t remember for certain though I’m almost sure Louisiana. he was very upfront, and said he sometimes walked from his town to my town along there because the driftwood reminded him of a place near home. it was the summer. one could hear cicadas or frogs and crickets or something. loquacious. but he said three years he had been here, and was not running from the law, for he was a good man, but escaping a bad group of people he had chosen. what had he become involved in? he didn’t say exactly. but he had found God, or his God anyhow. I told him he should check out Dr. David R. Hawkins, for though not perfect he was pretty good, and there was definitely something there. he said he never heard of him. he gave me a card. sometimes even preachers can have cards. but I don’t know what became of it. besides, what has a church next to the actual shining summer sacrosanct?

I have been thinking of the leaves lately, and of nature overall. they calm me. modern life makes me nervous. I don’t know how people adapt to it, integrate into it, become self actualized as they say in psychology. the towns and forests beyond, little streams of water, sometimes towards industrial grates in the infrastructure and other whiles in the valley walls and sloping parts of the earth in bumpy fields. opaque sky. fog and mist. the drenched leaves that stayed on trees through the entire winter. those leaves completed the hero journey from the fool card to the world. arcana major. arcana minor. I am the Magician and also a Gemini. and the other leaves, the fallen ones- they have their own destinies and will continue the soul path in some way. oh tree and spring stream, or celebrated summer wildflower colourful upon the joyous earth verdant. but then fall. serious and liminal. winter solemnity. where, someone asks, have all the leaves gone? 

there was in real life a hidden place and I went there and only a few people knew about it. even a beautiful woman followed me, dark hair and dark eyes, like a mystic, and I said to the woman, ‘You must leave and have a safe passage out, because I am continuing on, to the inner passageways of this place,’ and the beautiful woman must have thought I was rude, uncaring, but I was called to the deeper secret forests. and a bad spirit arrived and made fun of me, and I remembered a real life avatar, which is a human being but not like other human beings, rare, that works to help the earth, that I even received darshan from. and I had read that the guru had said to always be very careful, because once she was in a church and a dark spirit was hiding around a statue, an icon, where people prayed and sought the light. hmmm…and I remembered New Port Richey (sp?) and visiting and there was a statue of the Virgin Mary and it was outside and a hornets nest or something. but I then mostly watched lizards in the grasses and on walls because I was a kid. well the winter gives way to the spring and the spring birthes all kinds of things. I saw a soul that was kind and from the light and held all things good in their aura and atmosphere even as the world sank in its ways. oh what a soul such like that one full of God and goodness. oh what a soul. 

far the sun, an old dream, taken by the night and it’s rain, clouds. electric light. ghostly. the eateries and the theatre and before there was the sound of the storms on the roof, like a thousand marbles. what would say, St.Theresa, or an old time sage saint mystic seer devotee shaman healer et.al., think about the modern secular world and it’s ways? one drop two drop three drop four. the wind. imagine the forest earth places and the nocturnal animals, their dens and mysteries and travels. water on leaves. what shall we dream when the dreams arrive? will they be difficult visions of confusion and disappointments? or of pastoral fields both flaxen and verdant, sanguine and vibrant, wildflowers flowing and the sun glowing? souls. fortune. karma. kismet. cadence. Alan Watts’ voice giving a discourse. will we see the sand and sea again, ever? it’s up to the fates. I wonder if they like us? I wonder, as I walk the country mile, if providence shall not one day smile? 

they found the girl. she had been killed. and they found who did it. it was the ugly man with the ugly spirit. he lured her and preyed upon her innocence. he is a monster of course. a journalist managed an interview with him from jail regarding other incidents but he would not answer the media questions properly. 

I am far away from the north. it is good to travel and not watch and work on screens. I am in central Florida then. there was an alligator and it came in so quietly and just watched and watched this bird. I was behind the bird and said in a loud whisper, ‘Go bird go away this is no good for you can’t you see?’ and the bird stayed there and the alligator watched me and the bird. but, I think I annoyed the alligator and it eventually left and moved up the way a bit. the sun was really ascending then and it was hot so I went a bit away and ordered a drink. a mysterious blonde lady brought the drink. the drink cost 6 dollars and I would tell her to break the 10 and keep a 2 dollar tip, give me back just 2 dollars. ‘There is no charge for you,’ said she. ‘What do you mean, that doesn’t make sense?’ But she said again, ‘There is no charge for you, and enjoy the drink, we will be seeing each other again soon.’ and I took the drink only because I was so thirsty and I couldn’t figure out any of it. I soon left. I walked up the way and could see the alligator eyes in the water watching. it looked just like a piece of wood or debris that was around and you’d never guess it was an alligator but it was. I figured why bother it any more, right? and I went away. I never saw the lady or the alligator again. I found a walkway that turned into a bridge. I watched the clouds forming. I had returned to the world of my youth, to the place where I belonged, to where my spirit felt at ease, to where i was always protected by spirits and luck, by charm and destiny and the right karma and dharma. there was going to be an afternoon storm. I soon travel more, further south in the world. 

the island was immediately friendly and light, the inhabitants welcoming and joyful. an open aired bus traversed the market framed roads for a while and made for its destination the white sand coastline that married constantly a sea that was first turquoise and then further out, dark hued blue. 

how agile the small fish that swam through there like bits of colourful dream remnants and how atmospheric the myriad clouds that still allowed enough sun to gather upon the small gentle waves and the fine grain sand. sometimes birds could be heard chatting distantly about something and this conversation mingled w/three men softly sounding tin drums, pan drums. 

verdant palm leaves and indigenous shrubs, relaxed people and the noonday ease. the turtles are in the ocean and vessels roam,- motor boats, cruise ships, sailboats, yachts, and the world then is for long moments like a painting pastel and uplifting, meditative and contemplative. watch the turquoise water ripple just a little. can you see it? do you sense it’s mystery that has opened somewhat for you to read? and can the sea be read, discerned, known, like some story or poem, or like a kind letter home? 

the vision of the heart from spirit came suddenly and it was pleasant and kind and true, turning a little while after into a butterfly that flew. ajna chakra third eye phenomena. and also I remembered you, and how I thought the world would obviously cease when it looked upon your gait and countenance, you,- for your eyes and hair and stare and soul beyond and above and enthralling. and i was shocked that the world kept going- and thought they must be base, unleavened, asleep. why? for you are magic and seem to float above them. but…maybe that’s why they can’t see you. yet the spirit must know, and the angels and the  ajna, the akashic and the awakened dreamers and the other worlds…

I walked down the walkway with the rich people, and someone had put flowers in terra cotta containers on a wooden shelf and I stopped to admire them. ‘What is he doing? Why has he stopped? Tell him we have to go…’ and it was always the case, and I was brought along again but glanced back at the flowers that someone had taken the care and time to gather, to plant, to station, to water, to curate. and the rich ones talked and had ambition and cleverness, a cleverness like I had never seen before, yet almost no wisdom, and even less compassion. and we ate the finest things, from only the best menus. I said they shouldn’t eat veal, and that I had made a promise to my grandfather not to ever, and they all laughed at me each time, disrespected me, because they had become overtaken by the world and it’s values. but again I looked out the windows and watched the dusk hour, the birds silhouettes against the firmament. a southern breeze danced an indigenous tree and it’s verdant leaves. I would never fit in. 

I am back in the north. home. home is home wherever it is. the empty lands~~

the trees were bare, save for some evergreens and also the few that had brown leaves that never left. I could see that the sun shone now and again, which brought hope, and the memory of what it was like to have the sun all the time. yet, that day it went mostly away. people had walked the paths there before so in a sense it was nice for the way was not that difficult. about half way through a very good atmosphere was present, an internal and external geography of quietude, gratitude, and meditation. I looked sometimes at old fallen trees, and could see at other times the outline of a house or a barn far away, as distant as a vague dream. the air out there was fresh and cleansing. eventually, it was time to make the way back, and begin going home again. surely I would venture out again, to the empty lands where towns had ended and nature and clarity, meditation and insight, began.

seasons change. I think of North America. a never quiet continent. I wonder just what the earth is. I guess it’s hard now to really know. there was in that time the tall stationed electrical lights yellow and they waited seemingly forever, like coyote eyes in the night. eventually as if in a moment imperceptible the snow had begun wafting down in front of them. in practically another life the one had been driven in cars and looked left out of a window upon a similar scene, a place in a city though, deep in the strange soul of a metropolis at night where two neon signs, one light blue, and one primary green or red, it couldn’t be remembered which, shone upon the snow, snow that covered the world and worlds. and the sign, it’s light, blinked just a little bit, whispering. this was the world. this was the earth. this was the never quiet continent in all compass directions. civilization. what they had called ‘manifest destiny’ in school. bridges, vessels, planes. and man and woman lived incredibly long, many many years, learning in slow increments when they learned at all. and though the earth was made of tires and engines, of factories and machines and bay doors and steel, of ambition and greed and ego, there must have been something in between the snow and the light. there must have been. what was the place that the fortune teller’s gnosis came from? or birth? or death? or love? yes there was in that time the tall stationed lights waiting always. they watched the world for decades. spirits and people came and went. what did it mean? thaw-melt, spring rain and summer bloom. autumnal leaves leavened in the confident warm and cold wind, and the winter storm looming in skies then vexatious and present. and after it all? the stillness again. the strange worldly and otherworldly ‘isness.’ the poet and his poem. the long winter loam. where was the true way home? is it really under the lights? the tall stationed electrical bulbs illuminating, somehow like souls, little areas around themselves? how they allow Mata, for the ones that want anyhow, to see the nocturnal snow descending pure and new, yet ancient and wise, somehow. what will become of us? what will become of it all, if anything…

there is nothing they can do to bring back the girl. Dr. David R. Hawkins says you should get to the point where you are turning over a beetle in the ground if it has somehow turned upside down. to help it recover and live. i try to this. yet there are other people that kill people. the differing people of the world is too vast. what purpose does a killer possibly serve, all of the killers, other than to bring immense grief and sorrow to the world? why did God create them, or create an existence where they could exist? 

I try and forget about it. It’s too much. I concertante on mysticism, art, writing and poetry,  afire photography, on good people, which there are also many. 

sometimes autumn occurs. now beginning, especially at night and in the mornings, the fall is a time of colder air and the change of leaves, sweaters and jackets and the different wind or overcast textured sky. leaves become yellow and red, and many wither away upon the branches. the spiritual and cellular memory of all autumns past somehow seep into consciousness and dreams, and are sanguine and saturnine at once. endings. new beginnings. the far past and the near future. autumn. the night rain is talking, trying to say something against the window and sill. good and strange synchronicities happen. some souls I knew are not returning and the lessons have been learned, the experiences had, while new spirits are around and travelling w/me on paths figurative and literal. somewhere is the lake and somewhere is the sea. one last chance these days for the hard working summer bee. I listen to the leaves as they wave and psychically say ‘hello,’ whist some old humans have learned and several have not. no worries. my destinies are my own. where is the mountain? the long path is framed by wild sumac and it borders the farmer’s loam and field. see the yellow golden rod swaying in the pre-dusk. I remember myself. the earth there had dirt, rocks, sand, pebbles, chaparral, wildflowers purple and white, ants, and other. how to explain to the worldly who believe not in nature about its value? they think I am. I nonsense and I think the same of of them. my heroes are departed by have left their words and song behind. I understand and laud them and I know they would understand me. your eyes. your gait. your spirit. there are plums purple in September. they used to live by wooden retaining walls and wrought iron gates. I watched the storms overflow the ravine. a ghost from the other world came to visit me. I watched the night become borne and fell unabashedly in love w/the mystic sense

am I autumn’s exile? sometime the summer will have arrived and left, and we the true believers and long run mystical will still be on the same literal and spiritual paths. oh see the sun wavering dusk like even it lacks self confidence then and is falling apart to give way to the constellations and the solemnity of night. do you know though, that we have pocketfuls of dreams, songs, poems, and are not dilettantes but the actual creators? oh yes the leaves will fall, surely, but we still wrest poems and prose from the bare earth, from anywhere and anything. it’s a calling. once we were under the super flower full red moon. and once the green verdant lee and tree canopy of summer. southern tides. northern shores. birds everywhere. but again we know the barren branches await us. so we are not prideful but instead humble. sweater or jacket weather. the summer crowd is not bad per se, but they are fair-weather friends, not soul mates. oh autumnal colours, we will know you again, your strange providence and fate, our destiny mingled w/yours…

I am a dreamer. and a lost soul. my mother even says so, but not necessarily in a pejorative sense. we used to live by the sea. 

my mother read books and I watched the sea, but from a balcony. she read thick books and read The Thorn Birds in four days, which was a miracle to me as I looked on. there was not much but the tropical paradise which was enough. i watched the lizards and birds and roamed on my own, a bit further each time than I was allowed. she said the men on the balcony across the way were ‘bad men,’ because they waited day and night in shifts watching the ocean for a package to wash up. she said to stay far away from them if any of them arrived down at the sea. they didn’t come down though. just an elderly man w/one of those metal detector machines searching always for treasure. I suppose he found his share of lost rings or watches or bracelets or necklaces through the years. he had one of those tans so deep I don’t think it would ever go away. a tan like certain memories in time, or words in old softcover novels. I sat on the old abandoned catamaran beige and sturdy and stationed perfectly between the sea and where the world began for real behind. that is a liminal and almost unknown physical and psychological and spiritual space. the day would fall as strong as it had been. fall to dusk. the shapes softened. the visual sense lessened and the audio essence more in tune or pronounced. and maybe the inner sense also. I couldn’t see the treasure hunter. or the balcony men. I couldn’t see the water that well either. but I somehow knew the way back. I remembered the way home then. mother still reading. a stack of novels by her side, and beyond out the windows, the distant sounds of the tide. 

I think of many things, like the rich and the poor and the northern snow and the southern sun. I had a bad dream when young, and I had a bad dream when old. a lost soul. reality not much better. in the dreams I was alone in cities too big for me, w/no family or friends and I lost all my money and possessions. reality just as strange. the large Floridian flea market, and the old grey hair lady running a stand that sold car parts. then years later, the opulent building and I asked for a cab. ‘Do you want a luxury vehicle,’ and I said, ‘No, a cab, like a regular cab ma’am, because they must still have such a thing…’ and the cab driver said, ‘Fifteen years now I have been doing this. One thing I know, have seen now, is that everyone from all over the world wants to come here,’ and I look out the window and watch then rain in the distance mix so strangely w/the sun upon the earth and in the air. we go through a rich a part to a poor part and then to a rich part. the discrepancy of wealth on earth must be unparalleled in any solar system in all universes of existence under creation. we are immature, unfair, unloving, childish, selfish, stunted, backwards, partisan, ignorant, small-minded. I walk in the rains soon, humid warm rains, the same as when I was a child there in that same place. but then I go back to the northern winds and storms. what does it mean? tree. train. ice. water. ridge. empty summit save for sumac and a stand of trees. your eyes are demure and soft and easy and kind and have wisdom. I saw them. they know much, much, much. they are better than the world, the sly cold racket that is the world. they are like a song that makes things tolerable again. 

city country town the lake the sea the sky the sun the upwards worlds like water and the downward lands like anything. bloom rain mud grasses spring and the summer borne afterwords, wild and robust, colours in courtyards and birdsong all along. ghosts whispers doldrums down and then aspiring to ascension and the quietude of truth and knowing. autumn in the field…leaves and wind, a promissory note somehow for winter, cold and barren but w/it’s own particular beauty…see the morning has become suddenly and gracefully calm…a bird has stayed and waits on a branch distant. the fallen snow a million-billion-zillion crystals the same and different shining for the light of the new sun. 

there was a catamaran and behind it were the wonderfully strange buildings endowed w/a spiritual light. I know there was a white one and a yellow one and the restaurant in all those long and great years we never went to for some reason. and we had gone everywhere. what a strange thing to ponder, and it had marvellous yellow lights and the night rains would sound on the palm leaves that danced awkwardly in the tropical winds. but the catamaran. it was beige or the part you sat upon. it had been there for years and nobody moved it or troubled it or anything. beyond it was the sea. turquoise and green and blue and though people said it was dangerous there at night I entered the water because I had almost drowned as a child right near there but lived. and so death I knew would not come for me yet. even death had a certain respect of some unwritten yet cosmic and secret law. if the water went in my throat I coughed but the salt entered somehow my soul. and the constellations seemed foreign and belonging to something ancient whereas I was nascent and new. bright was the day. but bright against logic and reason was also the night,- lit by an intense spiritual energy. how useless and unneeded then was any form of book learning or any person or society. only a strange abandoned catamaran solitary existed. only the far lights shining on stucco parapets and bits of sand. only the salt water and the dream awakened.

one morning I opened my window and though I had tried to only focus on art and spirituality, I had remembered the dead girl and the killer. surely she was in heaven though and surely he would stay in jail forever. I took a deep breath. then I noticed something. an unmistakably beautiful scent. it was pouring in the window, but from nowhere, or nowhere on earth anyhow. it smelled like cinnamon aflame, something wafting and moving, dancing even, a fragrance like good food or perfume or something more, something comforting, reassuring. something angelic. 

 later I went to the wondrous whimsical woodlands and walked in the cool overcast air. I saw hills and their summits, valleys below and small streams. I wanted to lay down on the earth where there was green surrounded by small hilly parts. there were a thousand birds there it seemed. how I hoped to go there and rest and be and see. sometimes they would rise up as a group like a musical movement or vision. then, by some unknown knowledge to me, descend once more, blending into the scenery. but you could see them if you looked w/discernment, like notes like crystals like truths. the firmament held many clouds and sometimes it rained and I knew dusk would arrive eventually,- dusk,- better than day,- more atmospheric and interesting,- a prelude to night. prayers dreams poems. oh how I wanted to lay down on the earth and be surrounded by the birds,- the birds of the sky and ground, the birds of all around. 

i had walked a long way. walking was and is so healthy. the cool air had gone away for a bit, replaced by a different atmosphere. the sun was coming out. I looked back once, twice, then even a third time at the thousand barren trees beautiful as the warm autumnal wind travelled through their branches, a wind trying somehow to tell a story under the late fall sunshine and the bits of lonesome broken clouds. 

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Brian Michael Barbeito is a Canadian poet, writer, and photographer. Recent work, Breath, appears at The Hamilton Stone Review and IG7 (Indigo Gemini Seven), at The Notre Dame Review. Brian is the author of the book of prose poems, Chalk Lines, from Fowl Pox Press. He is currently at work on the ongoing visual and written nature narrative, Mosaics, Journeys through Landscapes Rural.