independence day, pt.1

[Name removed] left early, she wasn’t feeling in top form. Early at 930pm, it being a—the—National holiday. My family was still elsewhere, updating their new dwelling place (calling things other beside their traditional name—ie ‘dwelling place’ over ‘house’—does not good writing make), or watching fireworks from a more advantageous viewing point than our soon to be forfeited house in the ‘valley’ (I add that punctuation because really it is a downward slope into a marsh). So alone, sitting, I felt moved to move, and stepped outside, feet uncovered. The cold front brought temperate temperature, relief from the day’s earlier blaze, and enough light was present to ensure I didn’t stumble on unlit suburban street. I began to wander, following noise that surrounded sound upon sound. The bursting of blasts like artillery or heartbeats, explosives; but no light to attribute it to, the treeline obstructing patriotic spectacle. Suddenly song slipped out my lips, and a good one at that. One the earth had not yet heard and is unlikely to hear again. I wandered further but still no colors could I see, only pop-pop-pop and me. Light decreasing, out of the haze is a creature wild, a deer. Furry god, easily spooked and startled. The night previous I pulled into the driveway and almost hit another, or maybe the same—even this in the suburbs. We connected, this hunted (perhaps not here, but it feels it in genetic code from historical shared experience) and I (there might have been another or it was shadowy deceit). Then I turned around and walked home and did not cry.