Writing Gate

If the field gate is saturated and the garden soil too dry to

dig, my world is screwed. Having managed yesterday
to lay that pen for the second raised bed just before it poured,

such a reversal of physical law would destroy the triumph in

this job - especially as I had skimmed the turf like sheets of

lasagne because of the frost. If I cannot go out and measure

for a new one or dig the earth, I will stay here writing about it.

Anything can be buried whatever the conditions if you don’t

need it to grow, and a gate still hanging will always close.

Putting all of this to a bigger test, I set the house alight and

watched it glow, flames spreading along the lawn to take out

those oak pens, scorching border camellias and heathers until

dead, and then creeping ever closer to what it licks best, a

battle with the doused marinade of a bored gardener’s gest.