If time were compressed into a sphere the size of a golf ball and whacked with a 5-iron, would it actually fly? Would it rocket across the universe, ricochet off stars; get tangled in String Theory and collapse into a black hole-in-one?
Recently, her mind mimicked a circus. Thoughts tumbled like acrobats, cart-wheeling, clambering over obstacles of reason and logic, and in finale, presented human pyramids of surrealism.
Time...there was never enough of it.
Dew covered wellingtons. She stopped in dappled sunshine, looked up. Fluttering leaves, interlacing branches, and beyond the highest canopies - blue sky. She knelt, moisture seeping through jeans. Pressing a palm to moss, she held and released. Her handprint remained, fleetingly.
Death left nothing behind except memories. There had to be more to human existence. Were we just handprints in moss?
A carpet of bluebells nodded affirmation.
A deep breath. Inhaling wisps of toadstool, hints of fern, she stood and followed the path to the meadow. The farmhouse, brown against multitudes of green, seemed alien now, yet it was home.
Nearing the orchard, a memory of a long ago spring soothed her troubled mind. In this spot, he’d enveloped her in strong arms and softly sang,
“Don’t sit under the apple tree...”
She plucked a sprig of blossom, leaned against the tree. Soon blossom would fall and apples ripen. Apples would rot, pips would grow into trees, and once again lovers would sit under them. Perhaps some would even sing softly on hushed spring nights.
She smiled. Her lips caressed the blossom.
Spring was a time for hope - the bluebells were wrong.
