Response to Alan Watts

"If I ask you what you did, saw, heard, smelled, touched and tasted yesterday, I am likely to get nothing more than the thin, sketchy outline of the few things that you noticed, and of those only what you thought worth remembering." -- Alan Watts

Since you asked, yesterday was this:

Awaking to birdsong and sunlight

filtered through a tent's translucence.

The rhythm of the county route and my breath,

improvised music on a road rising and falling.

My feet at the bottom of a mountain lake,

clear water magnifying the roots of water lilies

reaching down from the surface.

Friends' laughter coming across the water

as if on a wire.

The mingled scent of pine needles and sand

opening a letter in my mind sent from summers past.

Woods, wind and water, and a marriage's first hours,

vows repeating like refrains, chants, mantras.

The sharp, malty beer shared with friends.

A nodding off in the passenger seat, Northway reverie,

part of the post-holiday parade.