A Pensioner

A Pensioner An octogenarian - he moved to the retirement home which promised all-year sun, blue sky, and sedate sea. A grey, balding, and stooped figure, his gait is far from firm as he walks. Panoramic vistas, crushed-cardboard like hills, frame the backdrop to his daily meanderings. His dim and distorted memories mimic the surrounding mountain range, hazily silhouetted against the sparse, cloud-strewn sky. A startled hare darts across the gravelly lane, to join a squad of exuberant fellows, charging headlong into the shrub, tails held high – quick flashes of white. Transfixed, he stops to admire the moor-hen crossing his path, her brood of chicks faithfully following in line. The pomegranate grove sheds overripe fruit, sighs with relief, longing for hibernation. Artichokes, green and bright, proudly claim eagerness to be picked to make room for a different crop. Rebirth and renewal, the pattern of seasons, calibrate the remaining years, (months and days), for this old man.