He walked out and kept walking
Past the fat houses that litter the valley
The flowers of summer almost gone
The puffy clouds pulled apart as if by buzzards.

At nightfall, far from town,
He came to bus stop
But no buses ran till morning
And so he kept walking
Through a shadowy valley
A litter of skunks scurried along the hem of a forest.

It was a bank holiday
And the sun awakened the world
When he returned weeks later
With a fist of mountain flowers.

They asked him where he had gone and why
But he had no answer.
Do birds decide to build nests.
He thought alone to himself.

It rained all the following week
And he sat at the kitchen window
Listening to the mice in the walls
And drinking coffee.
He imagined himself, among other things,
As a goose clapping in the thunder-charged air.