We were walking the New York High Line,
The old freight line of lower Manhattan,
On the hottest October day since 1928 –
So Trish took a breather on a bench
Beneath some tangled autumn branches;
A mocking bird immediately began to sing
‘Melodious at the noontide of the day’,
A couple of feet right above her head:
“It’s a sin to kill a mockingbird”…
“Mockingbirds don’t do one thing
except make music for us to enjoy.”
A crowd gathered to watch and listen,
Cameras clicking, selfy snapping,
Lost in the moment of preserving the present,
Oblivious to its elegy and lament:
Ghosts of the Lenape tribe slipped
Scarlet legged through the trees, and edgelands,
Through the penthouses, warehousing and freight yards:
Some harvesting squash, maize and beans,
Some foraging for wild leeks and onions,
Blueberries, walnuts, chestnuts and acorns;
Some hunting, some chanting:
Their songs echoing among the skyscrapers,
Their song of beaver, muskrat, otter,
Mink, marten, deer, elk, moose, bison, bear,
Fox, wolf, cougar, bobcat, lynx, crane, osprey,
Wild turkey, eagle, curlew, whale, wild oyster,
And the teeming shoals of spawning fish.
Trish got up and we resumed our walk;
The mocking bird stopped its song.
The Lenape disappeared,
The selfies stopped,
The crowd moved on.