Sketch from Cardiff, 2001

Creative Non-Fiction by Michael Fontana

The fishermen by the Taff stood like obelisks from the water, tall, sturdy, dark in the shadows of dawn, and silent there too, the only sounds those of fish splashing gently to the surface from instant to instant before disappearing again. I passed these men and they didn’t acknowledge me, which was fine; I felt dead already anyway. They seemed fixed on deeper designs in the universe, the motion of fish beneath the water the same as that of dreams and memories within the mind.

​I sat on the banks far enough away so as not to disturb them. But I could smell some of what they smelled: worms plied from the earth, rich with soil clinging to their moistened bodies; water occluded with mud, with fish, with worms, with all forms and manner of life so that each passed their respective scents into the river’s body; and trees nearby, rich with sap, with insects, with leaves and other growths, all distributing their scents into the farthest reaches of the limbs. Even the sky, once broken by rain, brought down that scent as well to mingle with the rest.

All this overwhelmed me, my head so heavy with aromas that I needed to lie down and close my eyes to process it. It recalled to me my childhood, moments when the world seemed fresh and new, when I raced out of the backyard into other yards, the span of the grasses seeming infinite back then. I could again feel summer’s heat reddening my body, rain soon emerging to cool it down, lying back and opening my mouth and tasting storms inside my mouth, holding an ocean on the tip of my tongue.

From the banks of the Taff, a sudden downpour spurred me to walk on. I next watched the way magpies hopped in Sophia Gardens, in the startingly green grass, rich from rain. The trees lowered their heads as if in awe. I carried my pack on my back, my clothes soaked, my shoes crumbling. Water trellised from my hair into my eyes, down my arms into the clench of my fists, down my bare legs into my shoes. The sensation was like that of worms that would someday trail down my body to devour it in death.

I was not afraid of death back then; I was afraid of life. The daily machinations of it, the interactions with other people, the taking of food and drink, the sleeping and breathing, all were a trial. I felt I could not bear them and yet I did each day, almost against my will, as if a judge somewhere had sentenced me to live in what felt like eternal imprisonment.

It was only in the presence of magpies that I felt alive in any way. Sometimes I knelt in the grass and let the damp earth soak and soil my knees as I watched these colorful creatures play in front of me. A forty-year-old man playing in the grass with birds. What a joke, what a laugh! 

I didn’t care. I felt more beast than man by that point anyway. I could have been an ancient tree sprite come to life, head diamonded with drops of rain, eyes bright with magpies, tall and lanky frame like a barren tree that bends with the wind. The psychic pain I normally carried with me like a basket of stones lifted there in the gardens, cast to the winds, replaced by a humor as bright as the sun that sometimes broke through clouds overhead to both bless and bedazzle me with its extraordinary light.

Michael Fontana

​​​Born and raised in Columbus, Ohio, Michael Fontana studied in Cardiff, Wales from 2000-2001. He is a retired activist, college instructor, and fundraiser who now lives in beautiful Bella Vista, Arkansas. He has contended with depression and anxiety for much of his adult life.