An industrious week–pear jam, gazpacho, chicken stock, yard cleanup… the delicious tasks of summer. Though it doesn’t say so, this seems like a summer poem to me.
A Boat In the Forest
Sixty miles from a lake,
no river or pond within forty-eight,
no ocean near,
and this rowboat, crisply painted, oarlocks
oiled, oars set and cocked,
in a small—mossy, pine needles—clearing
of sparse gray and yellow forest grass.
The light here: like joy, pain, like glass.
On its bow, in red paint, beside the anchor rope,
its name: A Joy To Be Hidden
But a Disaster Not To Be Found.
An odd place, a long name, for a boat
When we were first together, Larry and I rode the rails through the forests of Canada aboard a yacht strapped to a freight car–a different boat, a different story.
I am greedy, I want the other story too. Don’t leave me to imagine: riding the rails, aboard a strapped yacht. Come on: Give me the different boat. Give me the different story.
Later this week.