We watch horses drink from a stream that curves, like a moat, around the barn. Along its wooden walls, mint and sage and rosemary bushes grow in deep planters. Sun-warm, they scent the air as the animals brush past them. They leave fur scraps on the doorways as they wander, scratching their flanks on the rough edges. The hair is picked up by birds and used to line their nests in the rafters.
Horse-tack lines the long, far wall. The dull-brown animal-smells of saddle-soap and leather mix with the bright greens of the herbs and stream water. They lie on the nose like spring lambs on hay.
Outside, just beyond the doors, there is an axe and a tree stump.
There are always chains and ropes; nobody notices blood on farmland. Everyone knows there is always some killing to be done.
He chops wood to start a fire. There have been many fires in the same place and the surrounding earth is blackened and dry and covered in the grey ash of long-burned logs.
We see his face, blank but focused. You try to look him in the eyes but he doesn’t meet your gaze. You want him to see you as something other than a task.
He pats the neck of a horse as he paces back and forth. It’s peaceful to watch him move.
This is his ritual.
There are steps to follow.
He bites at his thumb and moves it in small circles just a little further than his nose. His fingers brush against something hanging around his neck and his lips move but we can’t hear the words over the cracking flames.
You can just about make out his face though the heat haze. He watches the fire die down, just standing and staring for long enough that the air temperature drops noticeably.
He doesn’t look at us.
He drags sacks from the barn. They leave wet furrows in the dry dust. He doesn’t open them, just grabs them by the corners and swings them into the flames. They are heavy so he has to get close enough to the fire to singe the hairs of his arms.
The air smells of burned cloth, hot pork bones and pig fat. Like an old barbecue or a house fire.
The sun is beginning to set and the shadow of the barn stretches long and thin into bushes and bracken. Dried sage burns incense-thick in the flames that lick bones bubbling marrow into the dirt. The smoke has driven the birds from their nests; what is left are beams hung with ropes covered in the tail-feathers of flown swallows. The barn remains resolute and strong, watching the wildlife flee and the fires burn just out of reach.
The barn doesn’t judge. Neither do we. He has quite a temper.
We just watch as he goes about his business. We don’t even struggle, let alone cry out.
Maybe he’ll forget we’re here.
Matt— wow. You truly have a gift, Sir. Since you started writing again— have life moments been really catching you and you just start writing in your head the very moment they are happening?
Your writing is like watching a great symphony perform. So many working features coming together to make one piece come to life. 👍🏽✍🏼