Another gray day
Brook rising to lap green shores
Saturated world.
Haiku LXXXIII
Ice out lake open
Final skims blown off last night
Dark wind streaks water.
Early April Saturday
I shouldn’t be surprised by April behavior, but every year I am, again. I expect warm, still days, with sun and no wind. I expect to be planting spinach and peas and turning my compost. I expect to be drinking my morning cappuccino on the back deck, and sitting on the front porch in the evening sun.
Instead, we got about 8 inches of snow yesterday, that compacted down to a solid 3 or 4 inch crusty layer on everything, including the garden bed I’d envisioned turning over, fertilizing and planting at some point this weekend. The sun is in and out today, but the wind is still chilly, and periodically dark clouds come by and some type of semi-frozen precipitation sheets down, like a prankster in the sky is hurling ice just for fun.
But coming back from doing errands earlier this afternoon, I could see a solid patch of Northwood Lake where the ice has moved off shore a good hundred feet or more, and the water was dark blue and sparkling in the sun. Jeweled water, banded by receding ice, April at its best.
Haiku LXXIV
Brook fascination
Swelling and washing off ice
Water diary.
Haiku LXXIII
Snow disappearing
Brook running black past white banks
Threading time’s needle.
Haiku LXXII
Water runs over
Ice coloring faint spring green
In and out of lines.
Barrell Mill Pond Dam
In the 1700’s, in York, Maine, a dam was built where a tidal creek flows into the York River. This created Barrell Mill Pond, which was managed to run a saw and flour mill. New England is full of these old mills, often just crumbling walls in the woods where a brook falls down a few feet. Barrell Mill Pond Dam is still a strong rock wall, 50 feet out across the opening of the creek to a 10 foot water spill under a small suspension bridge. The bridge leads to an island which is now a preserve. I walked there yesterday morning.
I watched the force of the tide running in under the bridge, through the spillway. When you narrow the space for energy to flow, it gets concentrated and stronger. As it is now in my life. I have about 70 days left in my job, and I can feel energy accelerating around me. The water is lifting up into ridged ripples and small waves, I’m in the middle of the spillway and being carried along. But I can swim, and I can keep my head above water, and once I’m in the pond, the water will quiet and I can float again.
Tidal Haiku
Tide goes in and out
In and out and in and out
In and out and in.
I called David tonight when I got back to my room. I’m away at a retreat for work, staying in a lovely spot on the ocean. He had sad news — the 20 year old son of a man we both know killed himself, on the train tracks in Durham. So once again, loss washes in. For David it washes in over memories of suicides in his own family and the recent shattering in his family of a new, young relationship that was full of hope and celebration just months ago. For me, it washes in deep sympathy for the family of the young man, knowing what those mind numbing, disorienting and terribly painful early months of grief feel like. With heavy hearts, we go to sleep. I’ll wake to the ocean. David will wake to fields of snow. The sun will be up, the day will move on, sadness will be a wake rippling behind us.
Haiku LVII
Shadows on hard snow
Brook beginning to open
Ice lacing water.
Haiku LV
Water hides its face
Running free under silence
Quilted snow and ice
Grace Mattern 