Watching the waterfall and the
golden fish swim lazily, he looks
up at the ever so green birches,
maples and oaks.

He will leave before the inevit-
able and somewhat sad but ironic-
ally anticipated turn of the leaves
to brown, yellow, red, vermillion

with edges of black before dropping
to the pond. Soon the waterfall will
stop falling, a net will be stretched
over the pond to catch those leaves,

a bubbler will start and the fish
will cease swimming and eating and
hold themselves very still in stasis
and perfect equilibrium with the

water. It will be like this for months.
Leaves will fall into the net to be
lifted out all soggy and slippery in
the spring. Snow will fall, ice will

form on the pond and a hole will
bubble up in the ice for the sake of
the fish now in their tenth year in
the pond. He will miss all this, but

he sees it in his mind’s eye as the
fish swim to the edge of the pond
beckoning him to toss them some
food that soon they will not desire at all.