Two times sweep past my mind looking back.
Coming round the long turn off a highway,
a little scruff of ground, the kind that exists
between routes nowadays, not allowed to go
free so much as taking that natural direction,
I had to pull off onto the glass-littered
shoulder: an eagle hopping off into the bush.
This is New York, mind you, somehow still wild.
Another hectic drive on another road
without sidewalks, large brand new homes
on either side, houses without community,
enclaves of separation, and there he was,
this jaunty, nervous and totally on-the-make
and stealthily on-the-move-even-in-plain-sight
coyote following along in a strip of forest.
As I slowed down, we saw each other
eye to eye, both of us feeling a bit hunted,
only it was just dawning on me
from the recognition he bestowed.
These two forms cling to me, rousing
strange feelings: I could die at any time.
Better follow where the flight and the jaunt
lead while I can still make them out
rushing off as I am to nowhere anyway.

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