South

 Girl at the feed store had light brown hair, the Russian color. The old man there has gnarled hands and is always looking at a wall clock that must be his. People talk about the weather with delight, politics with scorn and wrath. 

I like it here, daybreak, the bridges, blue-green water of the haunted lake and bricks, the churches are scattered everywhere as if God dropped a bag of marbles and wherever they rolled to is where you have a church. The cathedrals sprout up like grass in Spring. 

There are ancient graveyards that dot the landscape, sad mountains in the background and horse farm after horse farm along the quiet dirt roads. 

Morning, years from now. A crystallized sky-line, glossy rivers and the shivering slumber of icy-pine needles by the lake. The inky tar and black blots of boat-oil, patchwork canals of fence mazes and the dull hum of tired farm machinery, ugly old metal buckets of porch-nails and beautiful relics of rust.