Good neighbours

To my shame I’ve been mending fences again…
a quaint habit I inherited from my father;
he would rather fix a fence than parley
repair, and that it is where our views diverged.
He said fences were meant to make good
neighbours. In the intervening years I had it
wrong, believing a fence was a line of defence
along a disputed border. In my father’s sense
it was the commencement of a wider duty,
a line where trust and respect must meet
and mesh, where neighbours are
defined. I wish he could assess the null prospect
of my much maligned neighbour redressing
his self-indulgent ways, of rising in stature.
Today he watched me fix the fence – naturally
it made eminent sense to him as my cattle had
raided his space. When I said it was his fence too,
that the problem was shared he agreed, and
thanked me for making repairs. I would that
he could have read my face.
© I.D. Carswell