This Moment: October 29, 2011- 7:20 A.M.

The sound of breathing fills the room. The dog's inhales are out of sync. Passing cars sound like waves crashing. A plane and it's passengers pass overhead. The moon is an unknowable eye, hidden in the dense colors of the morning. I think of Hamlet's witching hour and wonder who wanders my land in the soul's in-between journey back to their underworld. The small dog sighs in his sleep, shifting to his side. I've seen this before; he is positioning for a scratch. Then the old dog snoring on his pillow will waken, growl, and unfold herself and with slow and halting steps, come to the side of the bed for her pets. The younger dog will try to solely occupy my hand, and failing, will leap to the hardwood and nip and snarl until both spend every last dime of jealousy, then return to their pillows, eyes on me, waiting to be let outside. A car is ratcheting down the street, squealing as if pursued by murderers. The end of harvest nags a long list of what has been left undone. The fields are stripped bare. The first frost has not arrived. The land will be planted with wheat that will harbor like a secret under the snow. The pear tree holds it's cache of fruit. Fallen pears lie beneath like a cast circle in a long forgotten ritual. I am on this fertile land, but unlike my ancestors, not of it. I know that although I am not subject to its mercy, I am bound to it and cannot leave. The light is turning night to day. Harvest is past. Soon, the dead will walk the earth again on the day set apart for them. I will leave a plate outside for my dead, leave a box of Lorna Doones on her headstone, pour a beer into the clipped cemetary grass between the two brothers, and perhaps this year have the courage to pour salt on the grass of another grave and let the darkness finally go. The sun is visible above the Rocky Mountains. Day is here. The winter is coming.