Yesterday when I saw you,
I couldn’t help but think of the killdeer that ran in front of me
the other day as I walked down the road, her “broken wing” hanging at her side,
her crying deet, deet, deet, then sputtering.
I got home, researched this bird and learned never to help her,
not to cup her up and take her home to help her heal,
her “broken wing” act is a defense strategy she used to distract me,
a predator, because I was too close to her open nest in the pasture.
Her excellent fakery skills made me think about using this technique
and the lessons I’ve learned the hard way so many times about people,
about situations that so often are never what they appear to be—
when I looked into them, I saw the true nature, the motives of those involved,
so better off to stay far away from those people at all cost. So sorry,
when you were approaching, I had to run off. I had something in my eye—I couldn’t see.