It s all become mute now. The blaring horns and Mozart music falling on perfect ears, soundless where the waves funnel, where the drum has no hammer to trip the nerve. The gentle rhythm of nature where our hearts beat. But one silent whisper satisfied nicely. How one was going to open up from the inside, maybe find himself rocking slowly back and forth in his rocker and everything would sound beautiful and plain again.
Sponges crack in too much air, remain yellowy dead until water fills each cavity.
Listening is a full lake . . . On cue from the sun he sprouts herbs in the garden, plants his fingers in the filthy loam. Seeds and starts and cuttings and water and heat from the lengthening days coerce the phlox and mint to cover his exposure to the Irish wind and rain. The healing begins at tea, the leaves that nourish the anxious lobelia flowers make him cough up the last winter s cold. He breathes freely through the summer until the shortening fall days.