THE VIEW

Emerald Hill could not have known. Spider webs from Australia riding high winds, floating, dragging shadows over Debussy's Coffee House, dropping white sticky shrouds on trees and shrubs. Or the intense activity visible beneath. Pinprick lights, blue as the radiant core of a nuclear reactor, sprawling out like cities seen from space.

On our street, seen oozing red like pomegranate juice, is something orange, round, and squashed. Carma, no doubt.

A grey compact car pulls into the court, near the white fire hydrant. He just sits there for awhile, doing nothing. The door finally opens. He sets something onto the street, perhaps a tripod.

No one has ever brought a drone here before. Ascending, it sounds like a giant mosquito. He stands back.

“Getting some good pictures?”

“I'm a Hive Mapper,” he explains, holding his tablet that shows a picture of the entire neighborhood. The software has overlaid it with a grid that, without much difficulty, might be interpreted as hexagonal cells.

“Yes, yes that's our hive. It's aptly named.” And there seems something unspoken, possibly a legal notification – No Blood Added.

But of course juice simmering out in the sun is just that color. There is an unexplained flash. It's a gabble of teenagers who might not have thought much about Pissaro, dancing a dope Caribbean beat, forget La Mer and ground coffee. A flash mob? The sky is unbelievably blue, chutes straight down a flat panel.

“But not a guillotine,” I add, savoring the spontaneous justice.

So decades roll, maidens doing cartwheels and such.

Sundown.

Our backyard is in reset. On the fence, looking down, is Mr. Finch – eyeballed beyond all possibility of capture by Frankie, motionless in stalker mode, at the base of the bird feeder staring up, who in turn is lurked upon by Twinkie, our playful one-eyed kitten.

So there you have it. One little bird, without even trying, has brought an entire train of events to a halt. Something to be learned here. What? The Hive Mapper won't get it.

In nearly horizontal rays are evening's gnats.

Hovering miniscule bits of starlight regroup endlessly, darting unpredictably in a flow of gentle breeze, each blur of furious beating wings tethered to others in their dance.

As the orange horizon fades, our neighbor's puppy yelps.