Some days…
I just don’t have words.
But I believe in acts,
so I walked back to where we had passed it,
where it had fallen,
where it lay motionless in the road,
at the side of the road,
almost certainly struck by a car.
I leaned down, Iooking into its lifeless, half-veiled eye,
framed up its portrait, careful not to move even one feather,
recording eight frames, its final, poetic flourish.
Respect.
Only then did I lift its exquisite, broken body from the damp pavement
and carry it to the safety of a wooded ledge,
safe from further automotive insults
and hidden from passersby.
Roadside memorial,
requiem for a broken poem…
Blue Heron gone home to rest
too soon.
Dammit, indeed, and, Goddam, thank Heavens for you. I wish dearly that every being could be treated with this level of respect and gentleness. We are all stewards to each other, it’s just that not everyone is doing their job. But you...you are.
It is the least that incredible bird deserved. Thank goodness for the ones who recognize that and do the right thing. Oh, the stories I could tell... I have gone to great lengths in my life to see to it that creatures who meet a similar fate on our roads are properly laid to rest. We all deserve such dignity.