Early morning. Overcast. Sky sagging into the trees; maple leaves glowing like Mardi Gras beads, and meanwhile the prim firs point discreetly heavenward.

I am thinking about books: books that I am reading, books that I am writing; about the distant cawing of crows, about tires on the road and the dregs of coffee in my cup. I am sitting here in my old bathrobe, alone in the house, yet the house is filled with sounds. Birds cry through the open window, and the refrigerator hums. The dog sighs. My heart beats. I am wishing for everything, for something, for nothing in particular. The planet spins, and I can feel it tilt.

At random I open my notebook and discover that I have copied out this passage from George Eliot's Middlemarch: "If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel's heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence."