transience

Land and sea: sure and unsure. Solid and liquid. The difference between inside and outside. Reality viewed through smudgy window panes set in dry, rotting frames - cracked caulking. What time has done to them, time will do to you, as well. A listless wandering through your darkened flat takes the place of your Sunday morning walk in the park. Spilling coffee on the floor, there's a bleary-eyed look in the mirror. Two: the number of grey hairs found in your beard this day.

For all the wrong reasons, you've decided to forgo your usual walk. The paths will have to settle for the footsteps of another. The squirrels will have to get their peanuts elsewhere. But the park will survive - you will not be missed. The gardeners are there now, weeding the flowerbeds, trimming the hedges, fertilizing the grass. With continued help from mortal workers, this park will be as beautiful one hundred years from now, and could remain as vibrant forever.

Here's you, with hurried brush in the back room of your flat. The canvas gets a little more colourful, and you wonder if you might work better with the lights on. Viva Zapata! plays in the next room. For noise. Marlon Brando was in that, you think, and time was not kind to him. You're mixing Cadmium Yellow and Orange on your palette, furiously chopping the two lumps together with your knife, looking for a certain colour. Waiting for it to appear. You move closer to the window for better light. The sky - someone's left it open again. Apparently not at all worried that you might escape.