When to Scotland, I came to admire the very beauty of tartan against a grey Scottish sky.
Smell my dried seaweed, the water was calling. Smell my salty breath, the wind chimed in.
I wandered off to see the sheep. Blackface sang a song about obstinacy and dandelion.
Then the land ended and sky became sea.
I hid away from the sun. The leaves scraped like abrasive tongues over my skin.
In the end, everything pointed me to the water. Away, away we go.
As I walked through a friend’s garden,
I noticed autumn’s vanguard.
Funny, I thought.
There doesn’t seem to be anything more beautiful –
than September Rain on a goldfish pond
than rain coated tomatoes (that won’t get red any more)
than a tiny pool bordered by hibiscus petals
than sturdy blossoms awaiting the end of the year.
Have you ever seen the peony’s bud?
It’s not much more than a tight oval.
But when the bud opens up,
the greatest petals
and carpels
and stigma
burst
out.
And while I inhaled the sweet rose’s scent
I couldn’t help but think that it’s a bit like the mind.
There is so much that the cranium
hides from the world.
You never
know.
Did you hear the knocking in your ears
as you passed the frozen potholes
it must have been
your own heartbeat
for there was nobody else in this world.
Cold leaked through the window frame and there
not moving not turning its head not rubbing its legs
sat a fly.
I bend to examine it closely.
Its wings were a perfectly symmetrical veil.
As I took a picture, I realised that it was soon to die and felt blasphemous.
Sometimes something gets stronger, shortly before it dies.
It rebels against the end, no one would have guessed.
Like the leaves. Look at the leaves.
Or like the sentiments of a year that is counting down the weeks. They creep over my back, while I stand looking over the Oslo Fjord, while I swish through the bright yellow dots in Slottsparken, while I squint at the sun.
I watch the last revolution of the trees; their end is marvelous.
You know, it will get darker from now on.
But as long as it lasts, we could treasure the golden days of autumn equinox.
We could stay outside in the leaves and in the long shadows and wait for our fingers to get clammy. We could listen to the gravel. We could –
One evening when the sun went down, everything turned lilac and blue and purple and gold.
I stopped on a bridge and watched as the colours changed.
Next to me, a girl embraced her friend for a selfie. Then she said maybe it’s the end of the world.
It was not, but still it was beautiful.
irisgassenbauer 