Linda Hill’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “Mash.”

Chaïm Soutine – The Village, c. 1923

The house that I lived in when I was six

had a cherry tree in the back yard and

rose bushes in the front yard

where my sister used to collect bees that she put into a paper bag

and she never got stung.

The house that I lived in when I was three

I don’t remember the backyard

but the front yard was big and bare

one winter, late at night  I saw wolves in the front yard

we watched each other through the picture window for a very long time.

The park that I played in when I was 11

I was looking over a railing to the beach far below

and a boy shoved me from behind and I flipped over the top

and I nearly fell down the face of the cliff but my foot got caught in the railing

and everyone including me pretended nothing happened- because nothing did, right?

The cliff I stood on  I was at when I was 46

I was watching the Super Moon rise up from the Ocean

me and the stars and Owls  had no idea my world was about to end

all of these places  live side by side

bemused neighbors mashed together on an unplanned  and  well traveled  street

Chaim Soutine