Cascade Lakes
I pass this place taking the kids to school
And point out some new aspect of interest.
They crane their necks for the last pocket of snow and ice
Glaring at them from up top and at the green fuzz just
Beginning to show on bare soil along the gravel roadway.
A stand of paper birch covers the steep slopes
In a red bloom slashed with white mixing with cedar
And granite blocks along a margin of black water below.
A rare fish lives there in a silvery body with a torpedo shape
A small fleshy fin and a single flap between the nostrils.
Looking for the kind of clean material I like to write
I walk with them to a neck of land where fast currents
Run full force into a narrow channel of stone and sand.
Along the way plants and animals from the different orders
Throw words and phrases at me which I catch and pocket.
The Climb
In a dry watercourse filled with boulders and forest debris
We listen for a roar and alter the direction of our climb.
Picking our way hand over hand up a ladder of stone
The soil is washed clean from every crevice and corner.
Spread out on a blanket of moss the juvenile forms
Of emerging plants make a miniature garden at eye level.
A pair of simple germinating leaves persist opposite
The mature palmate form with veins and deep serrations.
A seed falls on the wrong spot and later a grown tree
Perches on top of a boulder its roots grabbing in space.
An entire system upturned with dirt and stones intact
Is afterwards stripped clean to a skeleton of dry wood.
The pieces in this poem start flying apart
And the longer I take to do something about it
The harder it gets to put them back together.
We get to a vertical wall and admire the cascading waters.
The boy scrambles farther up the ledge above a stream
With spills bubbles froth and a quiet pool along the side.
She sits crosslegged on a flat rock in sun watching the lake
Through a screen of brush with green lights.
I get too close to the subject and the spray from it
Wets the paper so it puckers and makes the blue lines run.
Where I write in pencil over the moist portion
The letters are lighter and less legible to this day.
The Outflow
We go out a muddy track that deadends in a swamp
With wildflowers and a showy plant on a dark bank.
Sighting a crested duck along the river during Spring run
We find him here again by still water at a remote place.
For a moment while the lake is motionless undercurrents
Feed the outflow just enough to make the grasses wave.
Where the terrain falls abrupty off waters gather speed
And we feel ourselves giddy and weightless in a freefall
With them rushing into the valley below.
From the sketches I make that afternoon I select
What is familiar and available for this expression.
Much of what I find is undecipherable
Or untranslatable whatever the pains I take.
When I ask them how they like it they're impressed
Turning back to look at something way above their heads
That makes a bright crease between the trees by earth and sky.
Jay NY 5/20/94
Poetry at Fourpeaks.
(A Complete Poetry Index.)
Camp. Repose in a natural place.
Wainwright Mountain. Camp and the everyday world.
Connery Pond. Louise and Martin.
Giant Mountain. Louise and the kids.
Cascade Lakes. The kids.
Feeding Birds In Winter. The life cycle.
More Adirondack Poems.
New York City Themes. (A change of pace.)
Order Information: Poems For My Kids. (Including Author's Biographical Note.)
Email the Author. (Exchange poems or . . .)
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