Wolves in the Orchard

November 03, 2004

The border collies had chased each other around the trampoline for an hour and a half. The lawn was never really a lawn and the moss, which substituted as an ornamental green binding agent, was not tough enough to take all that clawing and gouging. A perpetual drizzle turned to a steady downpour and the dark moist soil became mud. Dogs don’t stop. Viscosity dropped and the cold bitter inedible chocolate bubbled and spat outward to spackle the surrounding grass. A trench was formed in a perfect circle. Cherry and plum leaves were pressed in dog paw contours into the folds of the shallow trench. The dogs were called in at the back door and toweled off just as early darkness called for the porch lights. Tomorrow was moving day. The trampoline would be the last thing to go. The house would be torn down to build condos. Subdivide. Subdivide again. Ten thousand years pass and the earth-churning machine finds the fossils. It is determined that wolves had been chained up to power a rotating assembly used to irrigate the orchard.