An unexpected visitor
The bird that sat on her window, it looked familiar as if it belonged to a different place
She can see that the city was not his place
Maybe he followed her train to where the trees don’t grow
Where the cars’ noises block the voices in her head
She can no longer hear her best friend—the inspiration
Looking out of her cold studio apartment’s window, she can’t see the stars
Her lover’s words resonate in her ears, he was right—she misses counting the bright pins in the sky
That yellow cheerful bird’s singing covered all the other noises around her
She wondered if he had been a messenger, if he carried a letter from The Pond for her
Although her apartment stood high above the man-made trails beneath
It was no match to the mountain she used to live on,
The broken kitchen counters that he’d promised to fix,
The cotton filled pillows, the wooden chair he proudly carved.
She closes her eyes humming with the bird, harmonies she once knew so well
She can smell it, the pond’s stench—what she hated and loved so much
But it escapes her before she can capture it; she wished to paint it on her pale grey wall
The memories were too old, and the paint has run dry.
Stranger Paths 