This Is How I Like It

“For a few seconds, there we stand—observers and participants—utterly mortal in a world of vast, unspeakable beauty.”

—Jacoba Urist, from Cig Harvey’s “You an Orchestra You a Bomb”

I watch the children, fascinated by every little thing in the conservatory. They reach their hands into the small pools of water, and I am immediately carried back to my own days of parenting my sons. I am happy to walk the gardens and share in their joy. I take a picture of roses against a sky that I know will be blown out to white and decide that I like it that way.