I ran. Like it,
I was gone
in a matter
of seconds.
Still I would
have liked
to have taken
that much
space.
The huge head
lifting. But
that was after
I went back
and stood
in its place.
It was aware
of me. Though
I was big
it scared me. Why
did it wait
for me to move?
It must have
known something
about will. Something
like that, almost
no brain, just will
locked onto a future.
It was caught
in my hair, sort of.
It flew in.
I was sitting
on the porch.
My back was to it,
of course.
You don’t think
something like that
will come after you,
among the small
lots, houses, signs
for Children Playing.
For a while I kept it
in a jar.
But it was better
to feel it
springing a little
scratchy, a little
sticky, between
two cupped hands.
Of course
I never could
look at it.
And always after
there was the question,
put it back
in the jar or
let it go.
You couldn’t
hold it for long.
It wasn’t that
interesting.
It was scary
to go forward.
I had to
walk under it.
It wasn’t like a crow
or any other thing
with its own business.
I was its business.
I thought I had my own
and could pursue it
but no. Suddenly
on my own road
I was a stranger.
You know it
by its tracks,
the same way
engineers know
radiating subatomic
things. You follow
them, they’re curious,
as far as you can,
sometimes
stopping
at the base
of a tree.
You look up.
Later a neighbor
might say you were
brave to get so close
but you know what
he was thinking.
You had no idea
there was a sign
you shouldn’t
approach.
There was a time
I couldn’t enter
a room without
scanning for it.
I was worried.
Always I’d spot it,
near the light switch,
maybe at the baseboard.
Now I don’t bother.
I’m used to it.
Occasionally
there’s a lot.
They might swarm
out of a crack
in the sidewalk.
You can kill them
but then
there are so many
stiff bodies
and it’s hard
to walk away.
I used to visit it
spitting out its cage.
I suppose, looking back,
it was unhappy.
But I was young.
It was exciting
to stand in front of it
waving and jumping.
You can hear it
coughing
sometimes by itself
in the woods.
You wonder
if it’s real
but then
you’re ashamed.
It never misses
or thinks of you
mornings it steps
down to the water,
stands a bit,
blinks. How can you
be sure? Maybe
it isn’t real.
Sometimes a head
swims by, or rises
to the surface.
Maybe it doesn’t rise.
Maybe it sinks
partially under.
The important thing
is that you look
into its eyes.
It doesn’t like you
exactly, not
the way you’d
imagine, but what
can you do.
You can never
uncouple.
Nothing
you can do
will remove
your likeness
from its eyes.
