Fantasia Number Ten by Mudarra

It was a good day to be a horse.

So I played hookie today, put off a few things, to spend the afternoon with my partner. I arrived at the barn at an unusual hour, but he was right there waiting for me, like he knew I was coming.

How the hell does he DO that?

We took our time. Groomed. Shared a couple of apples. Told a few jokes. Saddled up and headed down the road. Took some warm-up time, walking beside him, enjoying the Autumn colors.

Some trees bare already.

An omen.

Mounted up and took on one of the old boy’s favorite hills. It has steeper parts and round-offs and dips and climbs. A good workout. Let him choose his own pace.

Reached the black-topped cross-road and turned back the way we came.

It was a long, long decline now.

From the crest of the first rise we could see practically all the way to the end.

Trees, dressed in red and gold, lined the road,

A breeze brought a handful of leaves across our path.

Like a ticker-tape parade.

And then…it was different.....

We ambled almost casually along the road and past the gates of the city.

Hundreds and hundreds of jubilant citizens lined the path, pressed together like a wall on each side. Parting before us like the Red Sea.

Cheering.

Shouting.

Laughing.

Waving.

Their voices blended together into a roar the way individual drops of water become indistinguishable in the ocean...

We were bone weary, and still stained with sweat and gore from the fight.

But we collected ourselves and entered the city with dignity and humility. I felt him quicken his pace under me, my hips alternately rising and falling with his steady gate.

I looked into faces. Some young. Some old.

I knew none of these people.

I had no friends or family here.

I knew only that now, they were safe.

And they knew it, too

A child, lifted up by a father with too few teeth in his grin.

Her tiny hand.

A blue flower.

I accepted it from her with a bow of my head, and stuck the stem into my compadre’s bridle, behind his ear.

He snorted.

We rode past the adulation to a fountain at the city center and I slipped down from his back. He drank deeply, ears twitching with each gulp, like a heartbeat.

I leaned over and plunged my head into the cool, crisp water, rubbed my face and stinging eyes hard.

Pulled out and let the water trickle down the back of my neck and tickle down my chest.

In my reflection, I could see that the stains on my face were now gone.

Those on my soul remained….

He nudged my shoulder gently with his nose.

Then bent low for one more sip from the stream.

I scratched him behind the ear, in that favorite spot of his.

“So,” I said. “You want to be a hero?”

He gave a moist snort in my direction to express his utter disdain for the notion. But I think he did protest too much.

“You incurable old romantic,” I teased.

He nudged me again.

Harder.

“Don’t worry,” I told him. “I won’t tell anybody.”

But I’m not sure if it was his fantasy or mine.

Or somebody else’s.

sj