walking in the woods, you hear a noise (a to z)
A thump/crash/bzzzz.
Bugs? Birds? Something big and hairy?
Counting calmly to six
does not help slow
elevated heart rates that rev
fast. You
grimace and try to reach the magic digit
hoping it saves.
It doesn’t. Your
jumping heart races roughly. The biorhythmic eq
kept out of sync. As lungs fail to expand, heart valves don’t pump.
Laboring with a frantic vibrato
Mouth jaggedly inhales than
nose reluctantly releases air from
overused lungs until
pulmonary veins do their work.
Quick beats quiet. The noise returns. Maybe it’s just a blue jay
rustling in the woods, only sounding as big as a yeti?
So foolish!
Tricked again into contemplating
uncomfortable thoughts of
violent demise
wondering what would
extremely large human-like bears do to you alone in the woods. Don’t panic.
You don’t want to startle this type of creature. Running off frantically is dumb.
Zoologists know this. They have done the research. They have all the gruesome data.
with apologies to John Paul Sartre (z to a)
Zoom! A
yellow bike passes by the curb
extra close to me, making the air feel kinetic
wild.
Veering into my path the
unapologetic rider pedals off
to terrorize someone else who is running.
Silently I fume and rehash.
Red-faced, a tsunami
quaking with over-blown outrage. I wonder, what would J
P Sartre think
of my reaction? Would he condemn it as bad faith? An existential
no no, giving other ways of being no room?
Maybe the yellow-biked rider had a reason–
like they were riding closer to say hello or to
keep me company as I ran on the path or to offer up
jokes—corny, idiotic ones not requiring a high IQ?
I guess. Or
how about this:
gnats flew in his ear, down his throat.
Flustered, he failed to call out, “hey you!”
Edging close, all he could do was a hasty improv—
deftly swerving, just barely avoiding me, our escape from collision narrow.
Could this be why? Oh relax—
bikes will bike by too closely
and often it’s simply because the biker is a spaz.