Metal Horse

Lunar New Year fell on Feb 3. Anyone born before that date belongs to the previous year (Snake).

Horses need to be moving, even if it is just a different route home. The phrase let us wait sits badly with them, so they would rather start running and correct the direction later. Enthusiasm arrives fast, three things get lit at once, and something shiny can pull them off course halfway. They come across as open, brisk, unable to sit still. The fear underneath is not exhaustion but enclosure: a room without an exit rattles them more than a long day on the road. Ask them to describe next year and you get a shrug and a list of places.

Noon sun overhead, a horse still working the slope, and gold buried in sand among grit and grass. People like this usually cannot sit still; a fuller plate wakes them up, and half of what they do is real work, half is clearing up after others. Clutter does not frighten them, an empty afternoon does. Praise slides off, but point at a glint in the sand and they crouch down at once to wash it out.