6:25 a.m., The Boathouse, Gun Lake

The water like glass

Reflects rippled clouds, a golden streak of sunlight;

The lake bottom is clear, small bits of white shells like baby teeth strewn about.

Black bugs pirouette above, briefly land to touch their partners: their silhouettes.

A fish disturbs the surface, leaving popples as it dips back beneath.

Something small — a minnow — skips across the water like a stone.

Overhead a great blue heron flies by, with a rhythmic pumping of wings.

The sun, which moments ago examined its face in the flat surface

Like a mirror,

Tucks back behind the clouds.

Another minnow leaps, this time 1-2-3 skips.

Beyond the water’s edge, birds chirp and twitter, simple sparrows. But is any of this simple? And isn’t it all?

A boat rumbles closer, traffic sounds rimming the lake pick up. It is a work day.

The spell is broken. And yet, it doesn’t have to be.

This snapshot, like a postcard, will remind me: I was here. I breathed this all in on June 19, 2019.

Like the dancing insects, like the shy sun,

I saw my heart’s reflection here,

and in the memory of yesterday’s unexpected visitors: a turtle and a toad (carrying messages I so needed to hear).

These can bring me here again and again

Until I return next year, to this place, to these writer friends, pen and notebook in hand.