The Pond is Never the Same

We were later than usual and the twilight was gray and heavy.   A white cloud rested on the mountain tops and wisps of it washed down the draws outlining contours we don’t usually see.  It had rained earlier; the streams gushed in their courses and our feet squished in the grass.

As we started across the dam a red-winged black bird claimed his nest in the cattails. Swifts darted here and there following the jagged paths of insects.  A lone fisherman looked silently over the pond, his rod untouched on the ground under his canvas chair.  The storm waters had made the olive green pond muddy.  

Ox pointed to the wake of a muskrat.  The muskrat followed us close to shore.  When he caught up halfway across the dam, he dove straight down.  We didn’t see him surface again.  The only sounds were the rushing water, the black bird’s hoarse caw, the frogs.  Mist quieted everything else.

We stepped onto the path around the pond.  The park people had bulldozed the path and laid gravel.  The path was wider, gravelly and muddy – not as wild as it was last week.  The improved path felt unnatural.  Heavy drops of water fell from leaves of the bushes and trees.  

We looked at the mountain from a clearing on the path, the cloud hid its top.  By the time we came around into the open we saw that the cloud had enveloped the mountain.  The fisherman still sat by the pond.  It was almost dark.

We went home.