ADVENTURE WITH DOG
Quarantine, day sixteen.
Wait until evening.
Safer, less people.
Less leash.
The sky softly settles
as we stroll into the sunset,
city over one shoulder,
forest just ahead.
The moment we step off the paved path
is when I feel most human.
Senses heighten
Squirrels chitter
Trees whisper
But then
something
screams.
At first I think it’s a duck’s dying call,
that last plea for survival in the
grips of some hungry beast.
But the sounds intensify
and we walk closer
and closer
and I hear a man’s voice.
My hands shake with rage.
He’s torturing the poor creature.
It keeps screaming and we keep walking.
I can almost see the culprit.
There.
Through the woods.
It’s not a duck, it’s a goose.
And he’s triumphantly unfurling
pristine white wings
in a dance of victory.
He squawks again as the man chases him,
attempts to corral him back into his cage,
cheeks flush with crisp insults,
arms never quite within reach,
begging,
“LEONARD!”
You glorious goose.
