All looks calm and peaceful with the peonies’ mouths wide open. But along the edge of the pond the struggle for life and death plays out. A garden snake has caught a fish.

It’s an effort for the snake to swallow the fish. It takes a long time, swallowing a scale’s width and waiting until its jaw can stretch a bit more to get the next bit of the fish down its throat. How did it nab it? It must have been waiting at the water’s edge, hiding among the cattails to snatch the fish when it swam by.

Away from the pond, it’s calm and peaceful. The peonies are in full bloom and the chickens are enjoying the late afternoon sun.