Water

It has been the wonder of my life that I am allowed to savor the liqueur, the small things, the daily cordial distilled from the mighty rush that inundates my mind. For it is in the details, in the tiny flecks of light that dance on the floor when summer morning light shimmers through the leaves and touches the dew on the window pane, and in the small sounds a loved one makes as her nightly dreams come to their sweet closure...in these and in the thousand thousand other whispers in the wind that I find the savory spice of my life.

Tonight, my throat parched and raw from a raucous rehearsal -- I filled a glass with simple, cool water and let the beautifully bland brandy of the sky slowly roll across my tongue and down my damaged throat. The feeling was exquisite -- Milton's luscious liquor in the raw -- aqua vitae for my tired and sleepy mind. Simple water -- simply wonderful!

Mick

Water

I sipped some ice-cold silver from my glass,
And let the lively liquid touch my tongue.
Its fragrance told me tales of wind-blown grass,
After the summer's storm song has been sung.
I tasted sky from which the fluid fell --
The flavor of the summer sun shined through,
A cloud-borne precious gift from Heaven's well,
That sparkled like the sunlight morning dew.
I slowly savored sips of nature's draught,
That flowed and floated, flooded, fell, and froze...
I thought of all this silliness and laughed,
Which forced my liquid treasure out my nose!
I loved it, though I choked, near fit to drown,
Because it tasted so good going down.

Mick McKellar
September 2009