off a ducks back

there was a canal that i walked beside to get there everyday. it wasnt pretty, but there was something i loved about it, something still about it, something that made me feel like i really was away from home. it was one of those things that when you look at it, you see it through a lens of other people watching you look at it, like youre both the audience and the movie. there were ducks in that canal sometimes. and people fishing. i had always thought of canals as man made things, and because i cant imagine a man transplanting ducks and fish into a body of water from another, more natural, body of water, i just assumed nothing grew in it. or maybe i knew that things eventually grew, like algae, but i couldnt believe that from algae a fish would just come into being. there was this metal bridge, which was another incongruity, and it was so low that even when a canoe needed to pass they would have to get out and raise the bridge with a knob. or a lever or whatever the fuck those things are. the ones that you turn around in a circle.

i liked thinking about these things when i walked, because i walked with headphones on and i had never done that at home. the whole experience felt very foreign and comfortable. safe, like i had dreamt it or these had been the pictures i saw before i came here. of a girl with her hands in her pockets and headphones on with one leg permanently suspended in front of the other and her head turned to the canal, with the bridge's mouth opened to the sky.

sometimes bikers would pass, or joggers, or just people walking like me. sometimes i liked this and sometimes i didnt. sometimes it made me nervous, because i would still be debating whether or not to make eye contact when they were already upon me, and i had to do an awkward combination of both making eye contact and not making eye contact. but sometimes i wouldnt notice them until there they were, either running (huff huff) or walking or biking right in front of my face, sometimes making eye contact and sometimes not.

once, on my way back, i saw these two ducks in the distance. it looked like one big deformed duck until i started getting closer, and realized they were either fighting viciously or making love. there was a woman on a bike who had stopped, one leg on the ground, to watch.

it was a curious thing- one was obviously pissed off, the aggressor, and he kept chasing this other one back and forth the width of the canal. the one who was being chased would go under and disappear and the angry one didnt know what happened, but he knew she would come back. and see thats whats funny- i just assumed that the mad one was a man and the one who was trying so desparately to get away was a woman. sometimes the man would catch the woman and jump on her back and they would bob up and down, and thats why i thought it could have been making love. they looked like lions on the national geographic specials. but they would only bob up and down for a minute, until the one underneath would escape somehow and piss the one on top off even more. and they were making the most horrible noises.

the bike woman and i stood there and stared. we didnt talk to each other; we both appreciated that.

then the girl duck dove under and reemerged almost right under our feet, grappling frantically to get onto the sidewalk. she did and waddled hurredly into the bushes. they shook when she went in and it was one of the strangest things i have ever seen. the guy duck swam around in circles, not sure of where she went but seemingly positive she would return.

and she did, after about a minute of being in the bush, our bodies following the action. she dove back in and tried to swim downstream, but he was fast and he caught up quickly and jumped on top of her again. this time, she let him. she just floated along as he pumped her up and down, her beak splashing in the water with each pump.

i said, still looking at the ducks, "i wonder if she's getting beaten up or fucked."
and the bike woman said "its impossible to tell"