Aimless vs. Lost
 

In a small patch of green knotted around
by freeways and off ramps, a Canada Goose
stands in vigil over a second bird one ramp
away – a still roadside heap. The watcher
is suspended between dread and mourning
because it can’t get close enough to know.
This bird can achieve effortless grace,
But the ground unsteadies it. We can’t
know the mediums others travel by.
A journey is interrupted, unlike mine
chewed up into commutes I spit out,
unable to apprehend a truer medium
to transport me - a spiritual infrastructure
just over or below my radar. The bird
has somewhere to go, but now no reason
to go there, lost in an oasis of silence
in this desert of zoom. I want to tell
my wife about this encounter more intimate
than anything we’ve had lately, but we sit
in a quiet of mourning and a silence
of already gone, unwilling to approach
the other, aimless with the person
who once helped us get our bearings.