Jackdaw

As the river turned black below the swirling willows

I turned my collar, hurried for home,

cursed the rain.  But cursing

isn’t really my thing, I don’t

do it very well;  certainly

it neither stopped the rain

nor warmed my heart.  And yet

maybe this curse conjured up something

(if you believe that sort of stuff):  a jackdaw,

young bird I suppose, crashed down in front of me on the path,

looked back in astonishment at my lumbering figure

but didn’t fly again, maybe couldn’t, or didn’t dare.

Instead, he busied along in front of me

till the path left the willows, to dive

into the shelter of some taller trees.

There I stopped, not as much breath

as I used to have.  And the bird stopped as well, looked at me again,

tipped his head to one side for a moment,

then hopped into a thicket of nettles and thorns

and was gone.

A dark angel to match me and maybe to cheer me too,

on this dark day?

Not all angels have white wings.  Or maybe we were

just kindred souls for a stretch,

man and bird, bird and man:  there’s

not that much between us,

two creatures of dust and ashes,

the product of our genetic chemistries -

except that he could have flown,

had he chosen to, or dared to.