Just hang a left and pavement turns to mud and keeps them out
All except the most hardy
The most in need of peace
I pass the chained-off track to the pond
and I’m almost home
I’m almost to my first and only all-mine place to be
The timbers soar towards the chilly sky
I am remembering
Because I can’t see all that with my eyes from here,
under these quilts
But I know it well.
I fly, mind up,
soar over the tree tops circling the water,
smell the deep new green of leaves unfurling,
peer into the old brown cattails
scan the depths from dark green to the yellow of sandbars just under the ripples
I have swum, paddled, and circumlocated this body of spring-fed water
Peed in the moss, muddied my boots, thrashed through the underbrush
And will get to know it even better
To know its every edge, curve, inhabitants of the seasons
It’s why I chose my land, my place to build, to sink in.
The closest I could get to the clean water and no car will be needed
Walking to it,
Rolling on bike tires to it
Sliding on skis to it
Slipping, carefully treading ice and slush to it
Winter ice doesn’t t bother me
I long to see the feathery tendrils creep and claim the surface
wait until it supports me
Testing its edges as faults crack and black streams wind through it
I gaze and swoosh across with the wind