At This Place

For the past few weeks I’ve been putting together a Blurb book Altered Terrain: Changes & Consequences.  The mostly black and white images were made about ten years ago.  I arranged them with commentary or poetry which I have done with the series from my recent solo exhibitions.  The first poem is “At This Place” which was written at the time I was giving art workshops at the Rising Phoenix Retreat Center in Maryland between Hancock and Cumberland in the mountains.  It’s a description of that place and our country as well.  A bittersweet place to visit or live in especially in the days of lies and violence.  How it was long ago and how it is now.

At This Place

before engineers measured mountains

and blasted out triangles of purple stone

from the peaks.

Before trucks and cars flowed like rivers

through the haze on the hills

Pumas padded softly along spiraling deer trails

in tandem with the elm, the hawk, the snake,

the otter, the sky, the earth, creek, and sun.

Indians carved petroglyphs into cliffs

and looked out across silent valleys

meandering rivers

blankets of trees

blue ridges

With sun in their eyes at days end

they breathed in the velvety air

and exhaled cloud remnants of the river

where they drank with the deer

They breathed in the sky, the moon, the land

and took it deep into their hearts

where no word is spoken

where person and land meld into one.

The Natives turned then and disappeared forever

into blood red rain clouds and meadow graves

while on their heels the farmer planted

the first apple tree now nearing ripeness

and carved out fish farms at the slope’s base

felling trees and burning veins of coal

All is stillness and calm until cicadas sing

to cows belly deep in Queen Anne’s Lace,

Cosmos, and meadow grass

All is stillness until the first truck grinds its way

long narrow roads that wind uphill and down

All transformations are witnessed in silence

by the owl and the bear

by trees bearing cicada eggs

in the fullness of green

by leaves layered palms up reaching for the sun

by leaves fallen brownly on forest floor

keeping company with frogs, a smashed bench,

a doe with twin fawns.

Lost to the ones who are lost.