Fine and Fierce and Free: Canoe Poems for Spring Read online

Fine and Fierce and Free:

  Canoe Poems for Spring

  By Lenny Everson

  Illustrations by Lois Foell and Lenny Everson

  rev 1

  Copyright Lenny Everson 2011

  This free ebook may be copied, distributed, reposted, reprinted and shared, provided it appears in its entirety without alteration, and the reader is not charged to access it.

  Cover design by Lenny Everson

  ****

  (18 Poems)

  ***

  Sonnet for March

  Warm March air begins to melt the snow

  The soggy ground creeps cold inside my shoe

  The wind, like some vast river, starts to flow

  And restless I go out to my canoe.

  I kick a tiny glacier off the stern

  Chase a pair of rabbits from their nest

  I touch a last year’s scratch (to show concern)

  But in my mind we ride some river’s crest.

  The grey March sky begins to boil and churn

  Water starts to slide from under snow

  We both have winter’s lessons to unlearn

  And both of us have places yet to go.

  I touch the cold canoe, and somehow I

  Am crossing lakes, beneath a summer sky

  ****

  Tied

  Today I wore my tie

  The brown one

  Today the terminals hummed

  Today people discussed

  The way thing are

  At ten I looked out the window

  Ignored the shining sky

  Took no note of the clouds

  Nor the way the puddles reflected

  Cared not a whit for the freedom

  Of winds and waters

  And never, never, in my deepest daydreams

  Was I canoeing the April shoreline while

  The ice broke free and the trees proudly shook

  Their buds at me

  ****

  Canoe-Scrubbing in the Rain

  For all the Aprils that ever were

  I wrote this poem

  For all the men who ever scrubbed canoes

  In the rain, in April

  I write this poem

  No decorum is necessary;

  I have chameleoned

  All the white, cold winter

  Fooling only those

  Who don’t know me

  In the soggy, soggy backyard

  In the afternoon rain

  I pivot the canoe

  Over April

  And now it’s downstream

  All the way to autumn

  ****

  I Prowl the March Winds

  Call it an ordinary day

  I disagree

  Call it an ordinary wind

  Discount what it is to be free

  There’s a hymn within the March wind

  Opaque to the long drift of time

  There’s a resurrection to the rivers

  Water, from late winter grime

  It’s much too damn cold to canoe

  Ice lasts longer than snow

  But all I want, as I prowl the wind

  Is to get out the paddles and go

  ****

  Bubbles in the Flotsam of Time

  Ah, love, we are bubbles

  In the flotsam of time

  Part of some river

  Part of this rhyme

  All promises now void

  All projects on hold

  So many rivers

  Before we grow old

  The March wind is singing

  Some wild hero’s song

  The canoe is ready

  The evenings grow long

  Ah, love, we’re a couplet

  In the epic of time

  Let us follow our rivers

  To the end of our rhyme

  All dreams and all rivers

  To the end of our rhyme

  ****

  Too Slow the Spring

  Locks and keys, rain, snow, trees

  The sluggish dragon of March slops in

  Snow and rain, spring, winter again

  The beginning won't end and the end won't begin

  March is walls; the winter falls

  The sun crowbars it up again

  Tuesday's new, from off canoe

  The snow melts and crawls away

  Friday's old, snow and cold

  Locks and keys, keys and locks

  My mind flies. March walks.

  ****

  Strange Beast of Burden

  A half-mile of portage trail

  And right in the middle, where

  Juniper crowded flat rock

  The duck took off

  I damn near dropped the canoe

  Six eggs in a juniper bush.

  Those ducklings will need hiking boots.

  Many and strange are the ways of nature

  This man huffs the canoe forward

  And trudges off

  Through the trees

  A man with a canoe on his head

  Trudges off

  Through the trees.

  ****

  Song of an Available Man

  I suppose I’ve been sitting in the office chair

  Making paddling motions

  For about two weeks, now

  I suppose I’ve been staring at the map on the wall

  By the desk

  Doing the company out of time and time

  I think management should chuck

  A few of us into the wild

  Each May, for a week or two

  Just to find out if it improves our work

  And appreciation of company benefits

  I’m available

  Canoe, paddle, dreams and all

  I’m available

  ****

  The March Wind in the Willows

  In the transfer of seasons

  In the deep shift of time

  Are all the good-byes of a lifetime

  Are all the mornings of years

  In the long pull of midnight

  In the slow swing of stars

  Is the March wind in the willows

  Is the last snow on the lake

  In the glass vaults of possibility

  In the fragile winds of memory

  My brain links canoe to lake and river

  In the rhythm of animate breathing

  I stand, transfixed, in the rain

  Don’t blame me for seeing

  Farther than I’ve ever seen

  March is the precipice of a small eternity

  March is the edge of a dream

  ****

  The Springtime is Singing My Name

  The cookstove is polished to a fairly nice gleam

  My paddles are varnished and bright

  The packsack is airing out on the line

  The thermometer’s rising tonight

  Somewhere the ice pulls away from the shore

  Somewhere the rivers break free

  Somewhere April is calling the name

  Of someone real close to me

  It’s not that the house isn’t friendly and warm

  It’s not that the water’s not cold

  But how often do winds come singing one’s name

  How often does springtime unfold?

  The maps are tucked in a big plastic pouch

  The canoe’s on top of the car

  Measure tomorrow by the length of my stroke

  And my life from the first morning star.

  ****

  Down the Creek in a Red Canoe

  All the hills of April stream

&n
bsp; With warming water from winter’s dream

  All the hills and gullies run

  Away from here, one by one

  My life seems full of clock and plan

  That rule the time and lose the man

  But now my heart has caught the breeze

  In April skies, in April trees

  Down the creek in a red canoe

  Scraping over a fence or two

  Paddle parrying floating ice

  Ignoring timid friends’ advice

  The skies may fill with April rain

  But I return to life again

  Happy now, for it seems

  I’ve not forgotten all my dreams

  ****

  The Weathered Rocks of Paradise

  I stopped paddling, drifted

  To the shore

  Overhead, the branches

  Were bragging with leaves

  The ducks circled cautiously

  The canoe kissed rock

  I had no words at all

  I met a man who said

  He's never done that

  I found it

  Hard to believe.

  Does he spend each May

  In captivity?

  How does he ease his mind

  Gently to the shores

  Of Eden

  And scrape the weathered rocks

  Of paradise?

  ****

  Fierce and fine and free

  There are those who are most alive

  Around some river bend

  In spring the young ones call my name

  But I am gone again

  Ghosts and dreams and desperate schemes

  Considered – and forgot

  Cornered in the alley, yes

  But never, ever caught

  I’ve done my time at my desk

  Pretending to be me

  I am in truth on river bends

  Fierce and fine and free

  A flash of paddle on the lake

  A dancer on the creeks

  In May the old men call my name

  But only distance speaks

  ****

  The Suddening of Liferoots

  The aching April hills

  The glowing amber sky

  The birds repeating history

  My canoe and I

  The trees forgive the winter

  The lands return to mud

  The first day the ice goes out

  Brings a quickening in my blood

  For all of winter's longings

  Are found in April streams

  Canoe and I and water

  Are the basic stuff of dreams

  The aching April hills

  The coiling April streams

  The agony of springtime

  The wrinkling of my dreams

  My canoe believes in summer

  But I believe in clocks

  The suddening of liferoots

  The opening of locks

  ****

  I Almost Heard an Answer

  Six lakes over

  Seven trails along

  Soft in the April moonlight

  Came an answer to my song

  In the firelight I paused

  To listen for the sound

  The canoe was beached beside me

  There was frost upon the ground

  I sang again my favorite song

  A question at the sky

  I had maps to tell me where I was

  But none to tell me why

  Six lakes over

  In the thin golden light

  I almost heard an answer

  In April, in the night

  ****

  Chasing Dreams in May

  We have chased ourselves along

  Waters and Fridays

  Pursuing dreams where

  There were dreams, and the wind

  Where there were not

  We are not new, but we have grown smiles

  Like the trees do leaves.

  And we canoe blue lakes and find green fish

  Till evening scares us home.

  What is us, we owe ourselves;

  The rest will chase lakes and rivers

  And Fridays and winds, and, in late May,

  Cagey green pike

  ****

  Tasting the Winds

  I have not come canoeing

  Respecting the rain

  But cresting my life,

  I am turning again

  Changing the reasons

  Changing my mind

  Facing the future

  More trusting and blind

  The day too wet

  For sensible men

  But my longing too great

  To postpone again

  I have not come canoeing

  Needing the past

  Just knowing the rain

  Will probably last

  But feeling the corners

  Tasting the winds

  Touching the rain

  Where tomorrow begins

  ****

  Canoe and I

  Canoe and I

  And river bend

  God powers a world

  With no known end

  He finds the river

  Sees us, smiles

  As we happen on

  His chosen miles

  *** END ***

  May your canoe be full of love.

  May your spring be wild with promise,

  Fine

  Fierce, and

  Free.

  Happy canoeing!

  Lenny

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