Impact

I saw the great wings flash before the windshield and disappear.
Then I stood in the road, over the body.
My clumsy steel metronome of hazard lights, flashing
help
help
help
against the wooded dark. The owl’s wings were only just part way folded under its body. When I move it, I know if it is not dead I may lose my eyes, talons too black to see.
Dangerous as it is delicate. Lighter than I imagined, wings a living puzzle.
I place it down on a bed of leaves, beyond the edge of the road when suddenly its black eyes open, beak wide, it takes a drunken step forward
and falls back down.
Silence.
Another car comes up the road as the owl flounders again. “Are you ok,” she pulls along side to ask. She looks at me then at the bird. “Shit.” Her minivan has a white sign: Northampton Animal Control.