On My Morning Walk

Doctor's orders: fast-walk every day for an hour
to improve balance through brain-ear-body synchrony.
Four months now, most every day at 7:00 AM.
So, I watch the ground to avoid banana slugs, snails,
unidentifiable splotches of this and that, odd levels of sidewalk,
tree-root's revenge against man's cementings.

I just manage to avoid stepping on a black plastic fork
bird-like thoughts flitter through
wondering if fork is lonely for knife and spoon.
Is this like Kandinsky's white trouser button
glittering in the puddle...everything, he says,
has a secret soul, silent more often than speaking.
So, fork, I'm listening.
"Craziness," the Inquisitor bellows.
Used to that bluster, I listen harder.

Fork reminds me of an observation:
Providence Hospital cafeteria is half-way point
on my daily route. I stop for coffee and rest.
I've watched hundreds pick up napkins and utensils.
Here's the thing:
men take one or two napkins,
women, three or four.
Men keep everything separate, women wrap their utensils
in their napkins, swaddling-like.

What do you make of that, Inquisitor?