ALWAYS

Out of what must be millions
upon millions of those
maple tree whirlybirds,

my eye
always seems to focus
on one ruddy outlier

as it helicopters—
perilous, heroic,
and lonely—out and down

to some very likely inhospitable
patch of new ground.
And I wonder,

for the thousandth time:
whether
everything I am

is just all the things I can't
stop doing.
And then, for the first:

what will become 

of that heap of leaves
if I keep neglecting to sweep it

since I always seem 

to be so busy 

jotting-down spare phenomena.