The Yard

The train was moving past a suburb.

I looked out.

A man stood in his backyard,

absolutely still,

focused on his own hands.

For three seconds, maybe.

Then the train moved past.

I couldn't have stopped it.

By the time I understood

what I was seeing,

he was already gone.

Behind me. Becoming something

I'd never be able to confirm.

But I keep seeing it:

the stillness of him.

The way his attention

was completely on his hands,

like they were strange to him,

like he'd never seen them before,

or like he'd seen something in them

he couldn't look away from.

An injury? A revelation?

Just looking?

The train kept moving.

The suburbs kept passing.

I'll never know.

But something about the way

he was standing there,

in his own yard,

focused entirely inward—

it's stayed with me.

The incomplete moment.

The thing I'll never understand.