The umbrella

Blue wall

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…like people living in a country whose language they know so little that with all manner of beautiful and profound things to say, they are condemned to the banalities of the conversation manual.

Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence.

……………………..afternoon.
the wife is in the garden.

he has her umbrella.
‘here,’ he says
though it’s not raining
it might.

he looks up
at the bellied clouds.

‘I’m nearly done,’ she says
taking another lateral
from the wisteria  /

pushing her hair
out of her face
with the back of her wrist

she sees him
through the fall of dust and leaves,
‘thanks though.’

‘I was thinking,’ he says,
‘the garden really needs…’

but she had already
returned
to her work
in the undergrowth.

a splash of colour
was what he
was going to
say.


More on The Moon and Sixpence here – and something uplifting from Urthboy for you.

 

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