I saw the great blue heron from a guide on the Colorado River in Arizona. We were cleaning up at the end of a rafting trip. Open ice cube boxes, tired people. The hands carrying the equipment were dry, chapped, and bleeding, which is common during this season. A man behind me told me to look up, and I lifted my head out of the ice cube box. Whisking into view twenty miles above was a great blue heron. Its wingspan was a bit terrifying, like a flying dinosaur, with its snake-like neck stretched forward and its long legs trailing behind it. When it reached the telephone pole, right above our heads, its wings changed shape. The feathers unfold like a fully inflated parachute. They paused in the air, their hemispherical wings suddenly taking up more space than the two of us combined. It landed atop a telephone pole with the supple grace of figure skating. The wings paused for a moment on the outside, and the body swayed to find balance. Then the wings retracted.

"Jesus, look at that bird," someone behind me said. Yeah, God, I'm watching. It is nearly five feet tall from head to toe and has a subtle livid color that can deceive the human eye. It looked around at the trailer homes and rafting equipment below. From our perspective, we can see directly into its body. Its head is very colorful, with contrasting grays and blues, and a saber-like yellow beak. Its head is balanced on its long neck, completely detached from the body and turning freely. The movement of the head is a language in itself, the weight of the skull at the back balanced by the light beak at the front.

People came and carried luggage and walked around us. We didn't move. The two men looked at the bird quietly, attracted by it as if it were a magician. These blue herons are seen on the river every day, taking flight from the banks and deflecting among the dazzling egrets. Watching them always wait until the last moment to take off and chirp, as if they are doubting that you are so shameless and come so close. But I've never seen it this way. You can't see directly above it, you won't see its eyes directly. Now that the blue heron is so close, you want to ask some questions. But you can't. You can't say a word. You just stare at it as long as you can because at any moment it could suddenly fly away and you would remember who you are and life would start over again. The two of us are members of a species known for building roads, creating art, and claiming superiority over other species. As rational beings, we ask many questions and give lengthy answers, but at this moment we are deathly quiet. The blue heron had us. It is a strudder, patient and quiet, and time freezes as it waits to watch the fish in the shallow water. It sat high on the telephone pole, its slender, sharp toes covering all the edges. It fluffed its feathers, turned its head back and pecked it with its beak, adjusting the wire-like feathers on its chest, and the tips of those feathers spread out like a whisper. Its eyes squint downward, an adaptation that comes in handy when your food is swimming under its feet.

You can't look at this bird and conclude that one is superior to the other. The raven's encyclopedic vocabulary is no more enviable than the red-spotted toad's ability to drink from its skin. Man's penchant for deciphering the world is no more valuable than the pronghorn's uncannily large eyes.

People continued to walk back and forth. Stoves and drying cartons were hauled here and there, drained and drained again. Knots were tied one by one - a double half hitch, a coachman's hitch, a weighing hitch, a wine bottle hitch - to secure the equipment to the roof of the truck, and tarpaulins and ropes of various lengths were tied up. The blue heron's neck is slightly constricted into an S-shape. The focus shifts below. You see this movement before they take off, and they always pause for a moment, as if to make sure it's time to go. Its wings spread out and flashed against the blue sky. With a flap, it left the telephone pole. After flapping it twice or three times, it would glide away. The air holds up its body and turns into a kind of soil that has a fixed shape but cannot be seen. The big bird gave us a grinding cry and flew west toward the Colorado River, back into the desert and water, away from the guides and trailer homes that generations of blue herons had remembered as desert and water. water source. It has already flown away.

The guy behind me just said "Yeah." What else can be said?

You see this, even if you have no intention of looking. You walk out of the house and animals find you, even if you don't know they are there.

Whether you are observant or not, curious or not, aware, willing, or indifferent, they will find you. They move around you, leaving prints of various sizes and gaits, toe and paw prints of varying numbers and shapes, leaving their mark as they press their weight against the ground and watch you. . They smell like the sweetness of wool, or the black cane syrup of rich earth. In this humble yet remarkable richness, there are always highlights of form and function, and the universe is but a bottomless lottery bag of ingenious designs.