June 24, Newburgh. J at orchestra rehearsal. I pounded a report into the keyboard, then sat exhausted in the garden watching the fireflies. An airplane crosses the clear evening sky, orange-red contrail like a needle. Rustle of leaves after sunset. It is not really a garden, more a backyard. Tufts of grass between rotting leaves. At one spot J tossed a few grass seeds and was amazed herself that a short time later there was neat, fine, green grass growing. The grill and the motorcycle, two bicycles with rusty chains. In the middle of it all lies art tree, the remains of a large branch of a tree from the neighbor’s property that broke off in a storm sometime last year and fell into the garden. J and her brother first cut it off the tree in a makeshift fashion and then, using the small electric chainsaw I gave J as a gift, sawed it into small pieces that we now sometimes throw into the fire in the evening.