This evening after work I hiked into woods and watched. A soft wind picked up on occasion but for most of the evening the leaves remained unstirred. Saw filament curtains of spiders’ webs between trees. Jumped a doe while walking, who ran into the thickest brush downhill and hid, as if she knew hunting season was here. Heard geese and ducks fly in and land upon water. Watched a dove fly along the lane of a wash. Hour after hour. Near 8:00 p.m. the sun sank slowly. Mosquitoes fed upon the back of my sweaty neck. I watched a spider’s web bend in sunset breeze like the hips of Eve and those she named.

Nothing in my ears but sounds of squirrels, ducks, geese, the feeding of mosquitoes, the crunch of leaves as deer placed their soft cleft hooves into the soil, munched briers and acorns. The sun’s last rays of today shot gold pencil beams through the pin and water oaks and pines. And I beheld and grew more thankful.