I can’t quite remember at this moment what the city sounds like in the evening. I know it had the ring of neighbours sweeping their front paths, men passing the evening discussing the price of petrol and children being called into bed. The years fly past since I’ve lived in the city and know that they are a delicious and somewhat romantic memory. The countryside isn’t much different you know, we have our own ritual of putting the world to rest for the evening. Of late, our farmer is milking late dreaming of a time when he’ll have a new milking parlour. That will happen too.

You hear the swagger of a cow’s tail, a hello from a neighbour out walking ;‘fine evening.’ There is, of course, in May, the hum of distant mowers cutting the first silage of the year. The swallows chat in a quietening chorus that is settling down for the night. They call to mind chiacchiando Italian housewives comparing ragu reciepes out their apartment windows. The flowers are curling up for the night. The last of the cars roll back the road from the sportsfield to the clack of the ash hurls as they hit the wall in the mother’s hallway. The sound of that squeaky parlour gate closing.

Yes, just like you, we’re all ready to settle down to rest.

Sweet dreams