Monday, May 15, 2017

BEING ALIVE IS ALL THERE IS ~









After The Flood







The yellow birch logs split tough

Those are the trees standing after the flood



The sycamore splits with ease

Dies with ease









The Searchers







We didn’t ask for any help

where we worked in the woods

along the river and we worked

steadily for weeks on end, no

one ever came by to visit or to

lend a hand, except for a stranger

who said he was a rock hound, he

hunted for precious rocks, and he

was curious to investigate our river

land where we worked, even showed

us special containers where his findings

shimmered, and since we were working

on the damage caused by a flood we in-

vited him down with us and continued our

woodcutting huge driftwood trees, as he

drifted off, young with shaved head bent

searching and dreaming as miners do









Being Alive Is All There Is





Maybe you saw him too —

the happiest person in the world

not more than a boy

being interviewed

and his father was

interviewed too and

he was clearly not a happy man

he was but a man

with all the thoughts of men

I had a father just like him

I bet you did too

and this boy must have known

something, because the way he

told his story was that he one day

jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge

in San Francisco, and somehow he

lived to tell his story, and I think he

lived because we were supposed to

know, and now that we do

now what do we do?







River Flows






After the flood

it took four very long weeks

for our woods river to clear

no longer muddy

no longer murky green

no longer running toxins

people drowned in such a river

houses were destroyed

gas tanks, hot tubs, ATVs went down

trees by the 1000s, animals lost, and

just by its thundering new sound

people were frightened for miles

especially in the pitch dark woods —

then one day the river cleared

the sun played in it again

you sat down beside it

lifted off you boots

and stuck your sore feet in



————————————

Bob Arnold
BEAUTIFUL   DAYS
Longhouse