The herd

On a two o’clock drive home someone kept dimming the lights. The heat mixed with cool breezes so his open windows were kind. And there they were, crawling if moving at all, a herd of grey and white elephants in the sky. Making their presence known over the plain and over the hills.

A baby slid past its great mother, looking like a computer animation. And even though we’re getting better with our microchips, and even though this looked like an instance in a movie where you say, Oh God, so, so fake, it was real life anyway. To know that even nature with its frank disobedience can sometimes fall into line. Whipped into shape, not by our hands, probably not by any hand at all, but somehow following direct orders.

Silver linings, as they say, weren’t available, and much the better for it. Because while the sun was hiding behind the father, the animals came out to play, not play but rest, I guess. Lethargic beings made up of something smaller than you, yet bigger than anything you could imagine.

So he viewed them at two o’clock, driving slowly without screen or veil.

Looking to the left, it must have come from the right, a sense of responsibility. But not responsibility coming on strong like a storming. Instead, responsibility hovering next door, making serious hunters of us all. Seriousness like there’s a monster in the next room ready to attack at any time. No time for light heartedness. But the scene to the left slammed the door on the right, and responsibility was pushed away for one more quick flight. Waiting in the wings, winging in the seams, trying to claw its way through, its scratches muffled by an elephant’s glare.

So the peaceful ride home. Is a man supposed to think this way? Is this how a man thinks? Work is over, though never purely. There’s always more work to do, always that something demanding we roll up our sleeves and hunt the monster again. So is this how a man should think, begging the sky to take it all away? Begging for those olden days. Hundreds of years before there was a man on this street before it was a street, with responsibilities of his own. Without the crowded view, he could see the whole mountain. He could see from left to right. But the driver driving home sees false trees, new buildings, power lines. Take him back to those days gone away. Let him have his rest. Without commercials, without gold, without rubber tires and ways to invest. So is this how a man can think? Is it fair to be taken away? To slip into a different place while the real begs for attention, while responsibility claws at the door? To realize the herd where there isn’t one, for a smile? For something that’s neither here nor there, coming nor going, asking nor answering, something that just is, that is inside?

His mind shut down for once, his worry and fret and unrest moved off to the right while he looked left. And he couldn’t take his eyes off of it. He should’ve taken his eyes off of it. “He should have looked,” that’s what they’re all saying now anyways. They’re gathered around him now, whispering and tearing, “Why couldn’t he look away, look where he should?” But let’s all be honest here, if we can. Let’s try that antique practice we once knew. Let’s speak the truth. None of us could blame him. None of us ever wanted to look away.

So plastic pump and blinking light whispered hushed words of caring life. The rocks will cry out. Because those gathered around would only whisper of death. In a sterile bed he lay. But I think I know what he’d say if he could only say. Say instead of dream. Infinitely away from the monster, the hunt, the herd. I know he’d say, “But those clouds just looked so great.”