COYOTE (AS THE SUN MAKES ITS WAY THROUGH THE FOREST FIRMAMENT)

In the rustling of the leaves up the way or down the way, when the sound calls you to stop and pause, to turn ‘round and sense that something is there moving around, I usually had thought it was a squirrel. Now I know that sometimes, perhaps I think a third or even half of the time, it was a coyote. And there was, this time, as I stood quietly upon a ridge that afforded me a long and wide and high view, a coyote. He was not with mange, or malnourished, not downtrodden or crestfallen like some of the ones I used to see close to here, closer to more urban areas. 

No, he was majestic if a bit small, and something that seemed to immediately evoke a feeling, temperament or intuition beyond the ordinary. Some say dreamy, others say totem or lovely trickster. Words like quick, vision-like, or inspiring come to the fore.

           I say he was pure magic. Looking around, somewhat cautiously but still curiously, - the sun that made its way through the forest firmament shone on his light brown coat. In that moment, though I could not manage an actual picture, I chose not to miss it and saw the reality with plain eyes, open, true, actual, non-obscured. He had stopped and was even in stillness, against logic, seemingly agile, spry, handsome, curt, and flowing. The coyote himself was like the saying of Jesus in the secret Gospel of St. Thomas, when they ask Jesus what IT is like and he responds, ‘It is a movement and a rest.’ It’s both at the same time. And the frame of him, which was green pines and bright white birches, a meandering stream down the way and the blue sky up and up and up there watching between the trees.

            Is there a streak of white could even announced there also?

            Surely.

            The sun comes through and rests upon his back, tail, and the head and ears and face.

            And then coyote looks at me, surveys me. He is not afraid in the colloquial, in the generic sense of fear, agitation, and excitement. No, he just looks. Then he doubles back and turning round begins to gain momentum and more speed as he rises, as he negotiates the far away valley wall and travels off into the rest of the afternoon. We had met. He had his way and I had mine and we made them fine.

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