The Hudson River Diaries

A Compendium of Poetry and Natural History

gleaned from observations in and around Sparkill, New York

 

Bee Pond

 

Late afternoon walks itself down river roads

With no help from me

I am here only to discover friends discover me

Bright faces that lie past my appreciation

In the realm of love, which I thought I had forgotten

Or maybe never knew

 

Past the junipers, and into shaded gaps

A flood tide gathers at the base of quickening reeds

Palisades turn their blind, indifferent faces towards

Dead branches

Crashing down like poltergeists

 

These are strange events I cannot measure with the mind

Filled with the energies of time, and notable coincidence

 

Take the power of legs, of breath, of air

And climb hills tamed by asphalt

Into the realms where ice was dug into the rock

Saving itself for the dog days of July

 

Here the squirrels still remember how to leap and pray

Bees gather at the edge of tepid water

Worshipping the wetness of the dirt

The call of the ocean

Has not left their veins

For six hundred million years

2009

 

 

All material copyright 2011 by Lee van Laer. Do not reproduce without permission.