Suburban Creep

 

I never thought I wanted a suburban life and yet, here I am, some 37 years later living exactly that. My ideal dwelling would be a home with city out the front door and country out the back. I love walking in nature and Oakville (where I live, about 40 km. west of Toronto) does a good job with its trail system, paths always within a few minutes’ walk in each neighbourhood.

Forest bathing is popular these days for good reason, but the healing properties of being amidst trees is something that has been known for generations in various cultures.

Suburban sprawl comes at a cost – woodland and farmland disappearing to make way for residential cul-de-sacs. Across the main street north of me, thickets of trees and tracts of farmland are now being bull-dozed and turned into sub-divisions, displacing any wild life there.

I’ve seen foxes walking down sidewalks and coy-wolfs on the trails in broad daylight. Where do they go once their homes have been razed to the ground?

The other night I heard soft howling from the street below my bedroom window. There was no mistaking that sound – it wasn’t a dog or cat, it was a coyote. What was it doing on a residential street?

The next morning, walking along the trails, this line popped into my head: “I heard the sad howl of a coyote last night.” Then another line followed, then another.

Given my recent endeavour of writing sonnets, I returned home and started scribbling. This emerged:

Encroaching Creep

 I heard a coyote howling last night

On a suburb street beneath my window

I heard the sad call of its mournful plight

Was it asking us—Now where should I go?

I thought I heard birds chirp early at dawn

As the sun crept up from its’ dark night sleep

It was the beeping of a distant horn.

I wanted song, I got encroaching creep

Of concrete mansions, turf too groomed and lined.

I thought I heard a dove softly coo coo

Faintly beneath the clang of garbage grind

I thought I heard an owl asking me who.

         It is us, it is I, who wanted more

         Now the trees are further from my front door.

                                                                                Pearl Richard