Images of Lockdown
There’s a
single pure white dove in the cherry tree, looking like a Japanese
painting as jt settles amid the clouds of pink blossoms. It stretches
its wings, balancing with perfect poise before folding them again,
pecking delicately at invisible insects before fluttering to a
different branch. Is it a sign of hope? We are marooned in a sea of
silence, cast adrift in time without the anchors of work and human
contact. But somewhere, this small white bird seems to say, there is
the promise of a receding flood and the dry land of normality. It
flies off, a piece of cherry blossom in its beak, to its comfortable
dovecote in a nearby garden.
Down on the
ground, next door’s fat black cat stalks across my driveway, belly
low to the ground. Behind it is an unfamiliar tabby mimicking his
movements. They disappear into the undergrowth before exploding out
again with raucous yowls of indignation, streaking across the now
empty road. I hear the brawl continue from beneath parked cars, a
crescendo of fury rising into a morning of painted skies and pale
sunshine. They would eat that dove for breakfast given half a chance.
Later, on the fields, crows gather in groups, chattering together,
taking off and landing among a herd of cattle who, protected from the
chill breeze by their thick tan overcoats, move as one across the
green expanse. We dog walkers skirt round each other with nervous
smiles while our dogs bound over, offering enthusiastic greeting to
both canine and human friends, crossing the ‘safe social distance’
between us to reach up for a friendly touch or a treat. Their faces
are open as ours are closed; we stand back from gates and wait with
exaggerated courtesy for wide empty spaces on these narrow paths, not
stopping to chat as we used to do, but passing quickly as if
negotiating no-man’s land and hurrying home to safety.
Now, to be human
is to be separate, connecting only through a glass screen. Your face
appears as if by magic, small and blurred, in my unsteady hand. Your
voice is familiar but cracked and broken, not by your recent illness
or by deep emotion but by faults in technology. I speak into the
screen as we share our drinks in separate spaces, you a glass of
wine, me a cup of now-cold coffee. The physical distance between us
is small – a five-minute car ride or twenty minute walk - but we
dare not cross it yet.
Time stretches
and reforms, the days merge into one. The danger seems ever present
and yet somehow fictional too and the strange, dystopian dreams that
haunt my nights seem almost more real than our present world.
