Shiny Bits

Everyday we find more and more glass in the backyard. At a certain point we assumed that the glass would all be gone. But still, we find more glass. The larger pieces were the first to go, as they were the easiest to see, followed shortly by the slivers and bits clear down to the tiniest shards. Still, we find more glass.

All flat is the glass. No green, round, bottle glass here, but bits and slivers and shards of flat clear glass. A massive window smashed across the yard, we think, or a tabletop tossed and dropped. It may have been an unorthodox gardening practice tossing broken glass onto the begonias. We find so much glass.

We think of building a glass magnet to carry around the yard. Every bit of glass we pass would jump from the ground to the glass magnet and done we would be with them. Or a vacuum for glass to suck only glass, but leave the flowers and grass. A glass-sniffing dog. An electronic glass detector. A flute to make the glass stand up and dance! We would lead the glass off to the river to drown down below. If glass could drown.

We only found the glass when the snow went away. Perhaps it is snow glass. Or the snow’s window pane. Or the snow’s way of giving us gifts all year long. Some snow is city snow, otherwise known as jerk snow, not soft and lovely like country snow. Jerk snow kicks people off bikes and steals girlfriends. We think maybe jerk snow would break windows and glass tabletops and go to glass factories and rob them of their glass to leave in our backyard. Stupid jerk snow – we would melt it if it wouldn’t melt us back.

The glass will never end, we think. The glass came from underneath, we think. The glass fell from the sky to burden us, we think. One day the glass will stop, we hope. Good thing for the gloves, we know. And on and on. And we just stepped on more glass.