As I settle more deeply into fall, I've been reflecting on how I mark the passage of time and how time marks me. When I set out to describe my sense of time in the simplest way I could find, this poem arrived, bringing with it memories of a place where I lived thirty years ago.
Photo by Barry Troutman
Photo by Barry Troutman
Telling Time at Lake Chaffee Once the geese came back, once they floated along the edge where melting ice gave way to open water, I knew the lake wouldn't freeze over again. When I heard them call quietly back and forth in the dark, a mute ring of moonlight circling each one, I knew spring would come, moss-lush and blushing with buds. I knew summer by goslings in full-fluff, sheltered among adults, paddling the leeside of the islands. One October I stood on a ladder to hang storm windows, and their V passed low overhead. I couldn't see them slicing through thick fog, but I knew the rush of their wingbeats as they left. |