Little Bird

Not today, little bird

I am making my way around the wooded lake 

I’m not sure exactly why.

What I do know is that I am determined, focused, single-minded. There are figures spaced evenly along the trail ahead.

I can see them

For some reason, they have gray, flowing hair. It is wild, untamed.

I strain to look closer

And I realize that the figures who are walking ahead of me, evenly dispersed, look the same.

I am chasing each of these mysterious figures. But they remain tantalizingly out of reach. I re-double my efforts. 

But so do they 

We are in sync.

Bye bye bye

they say

I want you back

I reply. 

I don’t know exactly what it is that I’m chasing. My breath grows labored, chest hurts. I feel a chill.

At first, I think this is strictly a function of the hard work I’m doing, lack of fitness kicking in.

But then

I realize that the pressure on my chest is not simply exertion, but rather, sadness.  

tenderness

A sense of final,

the end, mortality.

It is me

at the end.

Not today, little bird

I am overcome with joy, and grief, and finality.

Not today, little bird

I jolt awake

But only half so.

From my half dream, the duvet is too heavy, and on even this brisk midwinter night, I am drenched in sweat.

Is this what a heart attack feels like

Or just two weeks of bad air

I’m close to tears, my proximity to the tenderness

of it all

breaking me down.

Then, in my half awake fugue, I’m suddenly on the volleyball court, making adjustments to my team, then realizing that I too, while coaching, am a player.

I dive to pick up the short, spinning serve, and replay this point in my mind a couple times.

Today, little bird?

I realize that it is me I am chasing around that lake.

But an older version

the one at the end.

I am overcome, by finality.

And so I weep.

When I finally come to, awake, drenched with tears and sweat, J quietly snoozing next to me

I pause to catch my breath, and ease my legs over the side of the bed. I slowly make sense. Still remain unsure of where I am, or where I’m going.

But

what I do know is this.

I am not ready to catch up to the man on the trail

Not today, little bird

not just yet.

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