This morning I caught a glimpse of two birds in flight. It was impossible to know their type, only that they were silvered on the wing and had a radiance most possible when the sun is low in the sky.

Here we are in high summer, a summer of discontent and national tragedies, a summer when it’s easy to feel befuddled and confused. There’s hardly time to absorb one reality before another asserts itself.

For me, summer has always been a time of healing. It must go back to long-ago school vacations. Summer was a time when we could get back to ourselves. Long books, late nights, deep pools — of water and of thought.

Now summer is over in the blink of an eye. It must exist in moments. Biting into the season’s first peach. Feeling warm sand between the toes. Watching late light slant through the poplars. Or seeing two birds in flight, with silver on their wings.