A Summer's Day Gone

Once there was a mulberry tree behind this fence, and a cedar, too, where a thousand sparrows made their home. They chattered each daybreak through all the seasons. No sleeping in, they chanted. Or so I thought.

Behind the trees stood a tank pool. Not that I saw it, because I didn't – but I heard the splashes and glee of the neighborhood's children on summer afternoons.

The owners of the house (on the left) had lived there for generations. And then one day they sold it and left the city. The new owner dismantled the pool and cut down the trees.

Now I listen to machinery in the mornings and wonder where the birds could have gone.