The Nightly Walks

We walk the local roads, dirt roads,

dusty and rock strewn, 4-wheel drive roads,

the dogs and I, roads going nowhere

and everywhere, dead-end roads leading us

deeper into our own thoughts, into ourselves,

my eyes scanning all directions, into the woods

on one side, noting spring’s new colors, and the passage

of seasons, new trails to follow, opening up, and the lake

on the other, my neighbors boating, a friendly wave, an eagle

searching, hearing a bird’s songs, his calling, the cry  

of the loons, and the rustling of something unseen in the forest,

the huff of deer in warning, or a bull frog disturbed in our passing,

the smell of earth and earth’s decay sharp in my nose, the sun

hot or the winds cooling as we plod along, going nowhere.

And for them, leashed and tugging me to follow, their noses

to the ground, every smell is rich, telling, sniffing whatever it is

they decern, a rotted log turned up, a patch of mud, the scat

of wilderness, a footprint, not mine nor their, not human,

perhaps some distraction, a far-off smell or a faint sound

I cannot hear, perking up their ears, alerting their senses,

a sense of danger present, a sense of some unknown

leading them along, this their world just beyond their noses,

a world perhaps forgotten in the next rock or bush or blade

of grass scented, their own shortened world changing around them.

But it’s how we go, these roads, a couple of miles into ourselves,

going nowhere, and discovering, perhaps, a whole new place

where we are kings, rulers of this domain we find on our nightly

walks, a couple of miles on the local roads, dirt roads going nowhere,

going everywhere, leading us into our own thoughts, into ourselves.