Nothing and Everything to See

A squat rectangular ink bottle with rounded corners
And a black plastic cap with an embossed logo
Not particularly intriguing

A mug made by my youngest son
Holding two Shaffer fountain pens
And various other writing instruments
Two nearly round stones from Bowen Island
That I will pick up in times of contemplation or anxiety
Roll in my hand like banding balls
A stout lamp of rust orange disks
Casts a soft light on it all

My desk is situated in front of a southern window
In a room
That like myself
Has had many iterations as the children have grown
I look out over the lawn and trees
Down the driveway to the corner of the dirt road we live on
In the winter I watch the sun rise over Mount Philo
In the warmer months after I’m done writing
The cat commandeers the desk top
Stretching out in the warm sun

I made the desk’s surface
From a single plank of wood on a warm January afternoon
The wood is from a local tree
Cut and milled by a local man
Who had grown too old to make use of it

The desk top is unvarnished
Showing the holes of insects
The marks of my saw and sander
Like most things
It is imperfect

I’ve had other desks
But this one pulls at me
Calls to me to sit at it
It does not ask me to be creative
But its mere presents precipitates that

My writing
Be it poem or essay
Always starts with pen and paper
The scratch of a fountain pen
Is the morning song of a dozen birds
Pushing forth opportunity
Wonderment and a puzzle for me to suss out

It is potential and life
Understanding and frustration

In the middle I will stop
Lean back in my chair and watch the world brighten
The rain drops detonate in the puddles
The Phoebe flit about collecting particles for its yearly nest in the eves
Then food for its young