JACARANDAS IN ALBANY

1 4 1 R J A C A R A N D A S I N A L B A N Y A L A N W I L L I A M S O N One must take it lightly, with light heart and light hands. . . . Those who are not like that are punished by life and God. – Der Rosenkavalier Stay away a few weeks and you’ll miss them – The thin, lighter-than-sky blue it takes a moment to see is really emerging between the arid stucco, between the pebble-shaped leaves . . . When I walked these streets, I thought only someone else could give my life back solidity. Was my impatience guilt at how much I’d ruthlessly left behind? Evanescent blossoms – and then the anger at her for not being the one I could stay with, at myself, the rest of the time, for being alone. How it all returns, with the maddening thin blue . . . Grateful only, now, if these little emptinesses helped me find the large emptiness, and anchor there. ...