Then, like a bolt out of the blue, the blue of the sky, the blue of the indigo bunting, the blue of the blues, a little explosion went off inside The Man’s brain, and he banged himself on the forehead with his open palm, as he was wont to do. He hadn’t done that in a long time. A broad smile spread across his face, and he said out loud, “Okay. Okay.”
The Man got up from his rocking chair on the porch, and went into the house and to his desk. He drew out from the desk drawer some more paper—a lot more paper. He grabbed a large handful of pencils and tossed them down on the desk, then sorted through them, chose a small handful he liked, and sharpened them; then took the paper and the pencils back outside to the porch, sat down in his rocker, put his writing board across the arms of the rocking chair again, and put the paper and the pencils on the writing board.
He stared out at the garden and the mountains beyond, but this time, he was not looking at them. Although it seemed he was looking outward, he was looking deeply inward, into that place inside himself from which the words come, that place his friend William called the Tone World—the source of all words and music. For a long time, The Man Who Lives Alone in the Mountains stared deeply into the Tone World. He listened closely. Then, again, a smile washed across his face. His pencil met the paper:
Take the road going north,
Further and further north.
Go up through the valley,
Between the mountain ranges
Up to where the West Running River
And the River Road go west….