Landscape for an Antique Clock

LANDSCAPE FOR AN ANTIQUE CLOCK / Robert Farnsworth This morning I read the cottage diary, hoping to find peculiar things from that old world we've seen in photographs, or even partially recall: pumped water's frigid chuckle into a soapstone sink, wingwalkers, steam locomotives, deliveries of mUk bottles in shirred paper caps. But she was only moved to write about meals, and parades for doughboys restored to their lives, her expectations of strawberries, clarities of weather—today the haze burned off by ten and we could see Mt. Washington— nothing I could read the historical future into, nothing it seemed worth re-imagining. Why should I blame her that days here were merely tonic, curative perhaps, of another life she never saw fit to mention; that she failed to remark the artifacts and symptoms of her era; that each evening's fresh supper and company brought her joy? The diary came with the place when the current owner bought it, a curiosity, or as Tm sure the realtor suggested, a quaint authentication. The sunUght this morning is a plain truth complicated, like an aphorism revolved in its retelUngs. 242 · The Missouri Review Under birches flounced by the onshore breeze, an overalled farmer glides over the hedge atop a pair of huge red tractor wheels. He turns in his seat and waves so earnestly. When I wave back the porch swing trembles and a few of her pages turn haphazardly in the air. Make yourself at home, the owner said when he left; make yourself at home, I thought, make yourself home. Now that I've read her artless history, I'll sit here weU past noon, wondering how long the wind will have to blow to strip the hedge of those white petals, fluttering from it like particles of light. I'll watch the lobsterboat circle the cove, and the periodic glint of sun on its practical cabin windows. Robert Farnsworth THE MISSOURI Review · 243 ...