ROADSIDE
Afterwards, songbirds sewed the sky
together quick. We barely knew it happened.
Too windy for words. A thud, a bang,
the squeal of tire on asphalt, the impact
of a creature leaping from this world
into another. We did not heed the gurgling
signal from the bittern who called to us
that morning from dried reeds. The blaring
broken horn jolted me into a memory
I had buried deep. I stared into the open
eyes of the dead mother. The young man looked
away, clinging to his shiny red truck, shivering
in the wind off the river. A vet would not
have had any answers. Her knowledge of bone
and muscle, artery and tissue, would not make
sense of this. That sudden noise, that vibration,
that moment of connection. I felt it, didn’t you?
I cannot pretend it did not happen.
The pileated woodpecker continues to chip
away at the reality he has been hammering
since last summer. The baby deer
lies there still, encased in thick tissue, birthed
against a guard rail.
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Published in Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and the Environment
Afterwards, songbirds sewed the sky
together quick. We barely knew it happened.
Too windy for words. A thud, a bang,
the squeal of tire on asphalt, the impact
of a creature leaping from this world
into another. We did not heed the gurgling
signal from the bittern who called to us
that morning from dried reeds. The blaring
broken horn jolted me into a memory
I had buried deep. I stared into the open
eyes of the dead mother. The young man looked
away, clinging to his shiny red truck, shivering
in the wind off the river. A vet would not
have had any answers. Her knowledge of bone
and muscle, artery and tissue, would not make
sense of this. That sudden noise, that vibration,
that moment of connection. I felt it, didn’t you?
I cannot pretend it did not happen.
The pileated woodpecker continues to chip
away at the reality he has been hammering
since last summer. The baby deer
lies there still, encased in thick tissue, birthed
against a guard rail.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Published in Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and the Environment