Today, two of the children were visiting, bringing their talk and laughter. It was a day of chatting of everything and nothing, of singing and laughing and playing with dogs and cats, of walking up through the fields on tracks left by the harvesters following scents and listening to the quiet.

Some things I never tire of, the birds, the sky, walking with the ones I care about, and listening to the world turning slowly on its axis beneath the sun and the stars.

There’s a song thrush singing in the poplars
as the sun goes down,
and the willows are full of warblers
with a few last quiet words.
The sky’s adrift with cloud boats,
grey-hulled with sails of white,
and the blackbirds croon a lullaby
to resign us to the night.