The Path

Close-clipped lawns, thick, velvety,
trimmed by expert hands
snipping with metallic precision
at southern waywardness,
border a gritty path of broken pebbles
that crunch with rhythmic complaint
beneath a heavy foot.
Before the slope to sea
it slithers, quietly, out of patterns imposed
to tangled shadows
beneath the wooded coolness
of aged trees,
canopied to guard hidden freshness,
rustling, nervously, at voices, footsteps,
unknown, unwanted.
With due reverence
the pebbled way slips out the magic circle
of green darkness,
surprised to suddenly
slip slide tumble
down sudden slopey banks
and fall, head-first,
onto a startled beach.

"Cranberry Lake Preserve" Photograph by Brian Ferguson