Walking the Dog

I'm walking the dog and when I stop I get bathed in sunshine it's the warmth of before like that feeling in the London Underground when gusts of dusty air rush over you yet this is: stillness I'm not sure if the volume of birdsong is dictated by what my ear chooses and a distant train blows a horn to signal a dreamlike state if I listen carefully grass crunches with infinite variation I hear birds that sang to me as a child - I'll know their names... if I can just think a little more there are no other people on the field so the warmth of the sun is shared but there are no shadows affecting my allocation I'm going to look for a butterfly as I have nowhere to be so I walk towards the farm viewing the nettles wondering how far for a dock leaf I'll count my steps until I find one as they crunch on gravel 1 - 30 past ivy 31 - 60 past overgrown cow parsley more than a minute - no dock and no butterflies but I don't need any ahh, there it is, next to the buttercups ha, and some more too! big enough to make bandages out of and a bumblebee on a flower! oh, and another human with a dog a stray pine cone dandelion clocks and then just the crunch of gravel through a shady copse to the next field? no, I'll go home, I'm hungry I can wait until later for butterflies