Butter Cups and Clover

There’s a fire, a soft fire, in a pit next to a stone wall.

The fire crackles.

Spits.

Hums.

A bird in a tree sings on the other side of the wall.

Whistles. 

Calls.

Trills.

The sun is setting.

Has set.

Is set.

There is still enough light to see the shadows that are waiting to surprise anyone not expecting them. The fire doesn’t care about the shadows.

It banishes them to somewhere else.

Perhaps in the orange of the ochre touched sky.

More probably among the trees on the other side of the fire.

Where the bird has fallen silent.

Or moved.

Someone has thrown coffee grinds on the fire, they say it keeps the mosquitoes at bay.

But there is no aroma of roasting bean.

The bird has started singing again.

Or moved back.

And the fire is softly dying.

Someone walks across the field and picks up fallen branches.

They walk around the daisies that are growing there.

The buttercups.

The clover.