Wobbly on desiccated legs, a proud father of three dictates his grocery list on the grand veranda. Potted trees hung with opals - the most magnificent any of us has ever seen - rotate on unseen mechanisms behind him. Occasionally a child throws a bushy little mitten or decorative writing instrument over the edge, and it falls into the mostly ineffectual moat below.
Fiddlers and trumpeters recline on salvaged comforters on the lawn, awaiting their moment to raise a joyous noise. Wistful in poultry waste, a music expert balances on a sycamore log, forming a capital G with her beastly body.