fence mon uow de of 050322 ... tessa Come sit down beside me I said to myself. And although it doesn't make sense I held my own hand As a small sign of trust And together I sat on the fence. - leunig 071028 ... raze it was never the finest of its kind. if there are such things as beautiful fences — perfectly-formed purebred specimens — this one would have been considered the runt of the litter. still, it always stood true and held what was it asked to. on tuesday, some brutal burst of god's pitiless breath broke its back. i can't locate the spinal column. but i know i heard the crack at the moment of its unmaking. now the slightest breeze leaves it creaking and reeling. and yet it refuses to fall. it's a lot like me that way. 250418 ... ovenbird For a decade we’ve lived in our carefully delineated spaces, borders defined by six foot high fences, their posts sunk into the sodden ground. We like to maintain this illusion of separation. “Neighbour” means: you stay in your yard and I stay in mine, even though your cherry tree snows blossoms into my garden each spring and my lily of the valley creeps under the fence and unfurls, poisonous and regal, from your lawn. I suspect you have a name, though I will never know it. But fences are ephemeral and the earth ate right through our imposed isolation. So today, for a moment, before wood is replaced with vinyl (so durable it comes with a 50 year warranty!) I can see that the land runs, continuous, from my back door to yours. You have a little patio, just like mine, and a pot with a tomato cage holding in the drooping body of its dead occupant. You have children’s toys (though I’ve never heard a child playing on your scrap of grass) and you have an abandoned hose, hissing, waiting to be charmed. I could step from my yard to yours, though I won’t, because it would be terrible manners. You do not want to know me. And I wouldn’t impose the annoyance of my being on the peace of your drizzly morning. Better to hope the new fence goes up fast, so you’re not offended by my living, with its weeds and its moss and its aching. 260923 what's it to you? who go blather from