Nearly time to make
a serious mistake. It’s
the only way to move
forward, my teacher 
used to say. See what
happens, then choose
a way to go to recover
or move on. It’s never
about success upon
success: it’s more like
how flowers burst up,
bud, bloom, and seem
to die only to come back,
and like them I could
likely come back from
the wreckage I plan 
to be buried in soon; 
death is after all
uncomfortable,
and as fruitful
as it might prove, the risk
of not coming back 
is large enough that 
every time a mistake
presents as an opportunity, 
I hesitate before
preparing to burst, bud,
and bloom. 

What kind of bird this is
that won’t fly away when I approach?

It looks uninjured, is unafraid; in fact
I’m sure that
not long ago
I saw it land 
exactly where it sits now
on the split rock in the front yard
that protrudes from the mulch
right behind the stone wall
bordering the sidewalk.

I fill the suet cages and it watches me
the way I might watch a delivery truck
unloading bread to the grocery 
next door to work.

Maybe the wonderment here should be
about how I’m mostly a delivery truck 
lately, unloading what others need
then disappearing. I should be grateful
I am no object of fear to some being
that could, if it so desired, simply fly away.

It’s a sparrow, of course,
but there are so many
varieties of sparrow
here every day
and I still don’t know all their names
or how to speak of them upon sighting;
It seems wrong that I am still so unsure.
It seems wrong that when I turn back
to my life among people, I feel the same.

It is a shock to the spirit
that even within the comfort
of this bird’s current regard, 
I do not feel I am at home.