This haibun is for the dverse prompt—cities.

So many cities I’ve known, ingrained in my bones with the heavy tread of bus tyres. Images stamped behind the eyes of crowds and bustle mutter, even in the nervous lull of quieter streets. Cities are the woodpecker tapping in the brain and the nerves jangling when they start up again, and the beer glasses shatter and the tears burst afresh.

So many, different, and all the same. I draw a line, push the screeching behind a hedge of eglantine, pull down the dowdy fronds of lime and dogwood on this quiet place and listen to the patter of rain on long grass, the skitter of lizards on the sunny wall, and the music of the wind, the stream and the thrushes. In this soft light, I watch your face, the only memento of the turbulent past, and it is enough.

Wind races