In my latest summer adventure, I traveled to Silver Spring, Maryland to meet up with my writing group, The Inklings. I’ve been writing with this group for around 10 years and had met several, but not all of them, prior to this gathering. We had talked about getting together for years, and we finally did it! It was such a wonderful, rich experience, and one that I’m still processing.

As I write this, I’m a bit further north and east in Maryland, having taken a detour on the way home to visit with another friend. I’m seated at a table overlooking a yard filled with tall trees and glowing lushly green. It slopes down to tidy raised bed gardens and a dock that stretches out to a tidal river. Every so often an egret flies by or a heron stops to wade among the shallows. A small flock of geese flies overhead. My friend points to a migrating silvery trail at the edge of the river. “It’s probably a muskrat,” she says.

As she and her husband vanish to complete some necessary work, I watch the hummingbirds dip and dive at the feeders. I admire the potted porch plants so carefully tended. My eyes follow their tendrils and waving leaves as they wind up lines of twine, skyward bound.

The house is silent.

Gifts

Morning’s silence wraps around me
like a blanket, or an embrace.

A leaf drifts down from a tree
following shifting air currents
meandering
until it comes to rest
on the damp grass drenched
with yesterday’s rains.

The breeze kicks up now and again
sketching ripples on the tidal water
that ebbs and flows
along its own journey
within guiding banks

The quiet grounds me
The whirr and buzz of recent days
subsides
everything shifts
and settles within me
potential nourishment
for some future blossoming

©Molly Hogan