Secret Garden Walls

A friend of mine, who has studied some form of Buddhism in Japan, has shown me that one should observe the movement of the mind, not judge it. I find this a fascinating activity, quite engaging in fact, as I watch my own mind drift from subject to subject, in and out like a fish darting through seaweed.

At work, a pair of hawks are building a nest in the pine trees at the front of the car park. Quite appropriate really, this is not far from the spot where cars park for their occupants to steam up the windows and do whatever it is they do in there until we call the RCMP.
The male hawk is in fact the one who builds the nest, the female watches haughtily from a leafless birch tree whilst he ferries twigs across to the nest. On the ground beneath them a backbone and tiny skeleton of a meal now consumed.

'Over the sooted, secret garden walls,
As in another Eden, cherry blossom falls...' I can't remember whose poem that is, but it's called 'London Spring' and we learnt it at school.
Here, the blossom on the flowering trees is just starting. Another of Vancouver's glorious moments is when the ornamental cherry trees flower, another Eden.

Half past eight, 20.30, only now am I closing the blinds, drawing the curtains, the last kiss of the sun on the mountains.