GOOSE BUMPS by Tom Lyford
Wild-eyed and incredulous I roll to a stop in
the driveway and sit, reconnoitering… from
a safe distance… this anomaly of the live
goose standing stock-still like some big white,
campy pink flamingo speared into my front walk
right here in the middle of town… leaving me
pondering whether this be prank or accident or
cryptic omen from the gods… wondering how it
came here and why here, why my house and…
what does it want? …I leave the getaway car
idling, step cautiously out (open-door
policy in effect) and—
What is wrong with this picture...?
Any goose in my life would be bizarre, but this
one…? This one has a problem… a short-circuited
‘popcorn-popper from hell,’ this bird is… ‘evacuating’
ever so ho-hum, matter-of-factly on the asphalt…
crapping steadily, mechanically, forever… Yes, the
goose that shows up at my door will be the sick goose,
the goose with diarrhea --Shit, do geese get rabies?--
I dare not avert my eyes, but something else…
something in my peripheral vision… a snow-white,
you-know-it-doesn’t-belong-there patch of something…
has been pecking at the shell of my shock, prompting
me, nagging me, to turn, to look, so…
Jesus-Mary-and-Joseph!
Lounging weightily on that sagging branch only twelve
feet off the ground and not fifteen feet from me… giving
methe old jaundiced eagle-eye… is the most powerful,
up-close, in-my-face, Wild Kingdom bald eagle I ever want
to see— Time stops… This is no dream… I can count talons,
distinguish feathers… I am a vulnerable, transfixed mouse
who has stopped breathing because if I move, scamper for
my pick-up, shark-hooks might impale my shoulder blades
before I can slam the door behind me— butsome distracting
racket, like shirts flapping on a wind-whipped clothesline,
breaks the spell and I wheel to find myself in
the immediate flight path of…
one desperate bird-bogey at 12 o’clock
revving its twin-engine wings in a spectacular,
low-to-the-ground take-off, the last of its cargo
jettisoned and steaming on the runway— instinctively
I duck left, barrel-roll on the lawn as the backwash of
the wings and the flight shadow pass over me and…
from my knees… watch my goose, already diminishing
in size, fly for the haven of any port on its last star-
crossed horizon… The eagle drops in a slow-
motion glide from the limb
patiently powering up, gathering
speed, resuming the mission,
and he’s in no hurry…
I feel my hackles rise--
He’s an ace, this boy…
It’s all in a day’s work
for him: a milk run,
a turkey shoot… and
humbly, foolishly, I
realize now that
I had nothing to fear…
I was in no danger— I
was merely somebody
else’s pathetic…
not-quite-good-enough…
but better-than-nothing
…diversion!
Wild-eyed and incredulous I roll to a stop in
the driveway and sit, reconnoitering… from
a safe distance… this anomaly of the live
goose standing stock-still like some big white,
campy pink flamingo speared into my front walk
right here in the middle of town… leaving me
pondering whether this be prank or accident or
cryptic omen from the gods… wondering how it
came here and why here, why my house and…
what does it want? …I leave the getaway car
idling, step cautiously out (open-door
policy in effect) and—
What is wrong with this picture...?
Any goose in my life would be bizarre, but this
one…? This one has a problem… a short-circuited
‘popcorn-popper from hell,’ this bird is… ‘evacuating’
ever so ho-hum, matter-of-factly on the asphalt…
crapping steadily, mechanically, forever… Yes, the
goose that shows up at my door will be the sick goose,
the goose with diarrhea --Shit, do geese get rabies?--
I dare not avert my eyes, but something else…
something in my peripheral vision… a snow-white,
you-know-it-doesn’t-belong-there patch of something…
has been pecking at the shell of my shock, prompting
me, nagging me, to turn, to look, so…
Jesus-Mary-and-Joseph!
Lounging weightily on that sagging branch only twelve
feet off the ground and not fifteen feet from me… giving
methe old jaundiced eagle-eye… is the most powerful,
up-close, in-my-face, Wild Kingdom bald eagle I ever want
to see— Time stops… This is no dream… I can count talons,
distinguish feathers… I am a vulnerable, transfixed mouse
who has stopped breathing because if I move, scamper for
my pick-up, shark-hooks might impale my shoulder blades
before I can slam the door behind me— butsome distracting
racket, like shirts flapping on a wind-whipped clothesline,
breaks the spell and I wheel to find myself in
the immediate flight path of…
one desperate bird-bogey at 12 o’clock
revving its twin-engine wings in a spectacular,
low-to-the-ground take-off, the last of its cargo
jettisoned and steaming on the runway— instinctively
I duck left, barrel-roll on the lawn as the backwash of
the wings and the flight shadow pass over me and…
from my knees… watch my goose, already diminishing
in size, fly for the haven of any port on its last star-
crossed horizon… The eagle drops in a slow-
motion glide from the limb
patiently powering up, gathering
speed, resuming the mission,
and he’s in no hurry…
I feel my hackles rise--
He’s an ace, this boy…
It’s all in a day’s work
for him: a milk run,
a turkey shoot… and
humbly, foolishly, I
realize now that
I had nothing to fear…
I was in no danger— I
was merely somebody
else’s pathetic…
not-quite-good-enough…
but better-than-nothing
…diversion!
