With two plastic bags for gloves, you make another grab for the beast. She is not even halfway across the blacktop. Cars roar past seeking the good parking spots.
The thing hops like a frog but has bone-snapping jaws. She is bigger than a beach ball and twice as slippery. Who knew such creatures still inhabited this place?
She snarls and flaps her leathery mitts before twisting airborne out of your reach. The rain sheets down in the flash of your hazard lights. Her fury has backed her now to the curb — the wrong direction entirely. You go in again. Again.
You stopped for this. Without a poncho or a plan, you planted yourself between this creature and her ruin. Turtles are supposed to take the long view but this one must have decided to go rogue. Here you are pushing back that inevitable day when the only animals left are in pet stores and Aesop’s Fables, and your only reward is a thorough bruising
She was safe and you were gone before I had a chance to speak for her. For me too. It’s never enough but here it is: Thank you.
Shannon E. Williams 
I could see it in my eye and loved the tale. Mary Oliver wrote about stopping to help a turtle. Her experience was not as dramatic!
Wow, it’s so nice to call up Mary Oliver. Reading her poetry is the way I learned how to see.
I had a pet turtle growing up and used to catch them all the time when I was a kid. I’ll say thank you as well! Great post!
Thanks! You must have been a pretty brave kid. Some of those buggers bite.