That fall I biked to Fort Greene Park three times
to see a Townsend’s warbler, rare because
it should have been in California.I staggered, fix-eyed, head back, underneath
an elm. The bird was said to look a little
like a first-year male Blackburnian.Its moustache sharper. Neck an Easter yellow.
A stray’s a chance to see a bird you won’t
if you yourself are not a wanderer.The elm was torn, up high, and from the tear
ran sap the warbler pecked at, for the sweet
itself or for the insects smudged in it.Sometimes, behind closed eyes, I see a paper
forest (woodcut), where I’m supposed to go
or should have stayed. (The end as homecoming.)A stray is temporary. That’s part of why
one wants to see it. The urgency, the sorrow.
It might get home, but death is likelier.I took a photo of the Townsend falling,
its wings two open fans, descending grace,
its toes, as landing gear, ungrappling,and thought that’s all any of us are
at best: ourselves not rare but having flown
too far, thought, for a while, prettier.
