A Moment in the English Countryside – While Debussy Played

I’m looking at a photo of an English meadow
descending into a grassy gulch,
surrounded by massive green trees,
and a bucolic pond sitting at the bottom like the remnants of milk in a cereal bowl,
the sun illuminating its pea soup color into a glassy sheen.

A Palladian bridge spans the length of the pond,
surely built by an English merchant in the 16th or 17th century.

I am lost in the photo;
lost in its beauty and timelessness.

What was once a wealthy man’s dream,
the manifestation of a vision to exhibit his wealth and taste,
centuries later sits as lonely as a forgotten orphan.

The bridge has aged with hundreds of seasons,
its granite in a constant state of expansion and contraction,
leaving it weathered
like an octogenarian’s face after years of drawing a razor across its imperfect topography.

I wonder who walked through this meadow in the 1500s.

Who had summer picnics on these emerald hills in the 1600s?

Who watched the leaves every autumn in the 1700s?

Who was lost in contemplation as snow fell in the 1800s?

Who celebrated the arrival of spring in the 1900s,
worried sick about an impending world war—not once, but twice.

People come and go with the seasons,
but this meadow was here millions of years ago—
maybe hundreds of millions of years ago—
while birds of various species chirped,
frogs leapt,
and deer feasted on berries.

Claude Debussy’s Suite bergamasque, L.75: III plays in the background,
gliding through my brain—
as gentle as a swan in a pond,
as graceful as an eagle in a thermal,
as peaceful as a newborn in a dream.

My eyes feast on the meadow—
without envy,
only wonder,
a childlike amusement.

I want to feel the grass under my bare feet.

I want to roll down the hill like a log,
laughing,
lost in the moment.

I want to float in the pond,
eyes closed while the sun toasts my skin,
ears underwater,
no sound but the lapping of undercurrents.

I want peace,
and joy,
and permanent escape.

I want Debussy’s piano to play forever—
his notes to carry me into the ether,
into galaxies where musical notes gather,
and dance,
and make love.

But I am content in the here and now,
spending an intimate moment with a French artist in the English countryside.

*Composed, Edited, and Published in Atlanta, GA