She had only a candle's light to see by, but candlelight never did badly by any woman. - John Fowles

We are all in flight from the real reality. That is the basic definition of Homo Sapiens.

Death starves us of life. So we learn to fabricate our own immortalities.

The bowed head, the buried face. She is silent, she will never speak, never forgive, never reach a hand, never leave this frozen present tense. All waits, suspended. Suspended the autumn trees, the autumn sky, anonymous people. A blackbird, poor fool, sings out of season from the willows by the lake. A flight of pigeons over the houses; fragments of freedom, hazard, an anagram made flesh. And somewhere the stinging smell of burning leaves.