Poetry Series: Stillwater River; Child of the Leaves
By Chris Gardner
Artist Statement
Both of these poems were written in co-respondence with the natural environment of Maine. I attempted through them to capture the ways in which time spent in communion with nature, whether that be walking along the Stillwater River as it touches the UMaine campus, or meandering through the close pines in the Bangor City Forest, or any other of the myriad ways to encounter the rich natural treasures of our state. Doing so has allowed me to center myself in the presence of what is, rather than be lost in mental abstractions. Ironically, the mental abstraction of the poem “Stillwater River” is meant to capture this process, while “CHILD OF THE LEAVES” is an attempt to personify that moment of encounter and the subsequent amelioration through the healing power of communion with nature. None of these encounters are possible without carefully stewarded public lands that are preserved for their own sake as living ecosystems. The dialogue I am attempting to generate here is between the reader and the encounter with natural space, and ideally will engender in them a respect for and understanding of what wild spaces can provide beyond material, economic benefits.
Stillwater River
I’m looking out now
I’m trying not to
look in
at the Stillwater silhouette
still water
just still
listening to Canadian geese too late who
have missed their moment and wait for it
to come back
but please do any of us know?
each snowflake really is
almost perfectly unique
that’s real
no sudden phenomenon but
realization I could almost sense it
if I had any sense
I’d look at all the snowflakes
catching in my knotted hair
and go raving naked lunatic at last
if it wasn’t for the W-2’s
and in them the second world war
but even I
a poor blind sinner mother
am almost perfect
for all is as the waves wills it
and will be so again
right Pablo?
we are winning we’re alive
(Neruda
O’ Hara
Korea
Bermuda)
ooh I wanna take ya
down
to the riverside
to baptize
in the still ice
in full view of the jury
of Canadian geese
and hold you under just
a second too long so you wonder, is this all there really is?
but of course it isn’t because beneath us all beneath the crystalline structures of dirty plow snow and ice that almost killed me so close to home is the first
the very first
THE blade of grass
which will arise again in the spring
and no one will see
making it
almost perfect
as it nestles into life between the steam factory
and the still water river
where the fairies manufacture what? Steam?
YES it billows up to god like
a funeral pyre or unheard whisper and tickles his nose oh no
He’s allergic!
back to the Frankenstein
and the myrrh
and so the smoke goes blows quietly
forgotten save for the moment
the light catches it
just right like the golden hour reflected in the brown of your irises and makes them golden just like it
it’s almost perfect
just like me
or you
or anyone!
caught but for the moment in amber superstructures
pushed into the snowbank between (can I make a deposit?)
me and river
you and the river
we and the river
when it melts we are the river
it will be
almost perfect
and in that way the most poetic
in the Japanese sense.
Child of the Leaves
Standing in the kitchen
sucking in my gut
feeling overwhelmed and underripe
slipping in slick sounds
falling
in puddles of undone dishes
and conversation—rent is due
When a cold creeping word slips
soft through the window pain
whispers of the cold fire
and the great dying done
right outside the window, Look
to trees of crimson and gold
and awareness awakened
LOOK at them
just once
the bombardier trees loosing a fiery load
each bomb precious
crashing quiet against the exploding voices
in the kitchen
an electric cobweb of words cut clean through
by words beyond words
nature beyond nature
by the old voice of one beyond time and kitchens
calling me, calling ME
to slide out of the kitchen skin and into something
else,
And I do–– I leave.
That’s all I do.
That’s not true (I grab the gun) because it’s dangerous to go alone
and I am no noble
nor knight nor seer of high visions
but I know there’s more to life
than meets the I
and the eye knows this.
Sometimes shadows slink and slither
in ways wavering and unmoored
from the cold drab concrete slab
sometimes a creature black and grim
too tall too wild too like me
can be seen in the mind’s eye
and increasingly I think
I see his visage in my mind
Now, I break
branches that block and point
the way
Living shaking trees
with breaks too high for the hand of man
Yes!
a very god
a Forest God!
with the answer to it all:
the forest groves, the pressure machine,
the pressure behind my eyes
and what it all means
about me.
Snapping twigs
and cracking bones
carving through leaves long burnt
I fall
rise bloodied and bruised
a pilgrim
and I must speak my peace to the deep
to the dark heart of the north woods
where silence is full
and sounds long and cold
bone cold
that never quite goes away
There the trees sing
short sharp barks
of ash on elm
the wind applauds
through needled pines
There I saw shapes shift
and turn
too human–no, more
and a not-wind whispered a not-language
and I thought, are they?
are they looking for me my family?
Them?
Am I?
am I
am i
at last
I am
face to awful face
with the great creature at the heart
too tall too wild too human
hair all over, crimson and gold
it spoke to me
in a voice of thunder
running rivers
and growing moss
the voice heard at the back of dreams
FWAAHRUUWAARAASHEEEEE
CREEEWHOOOWEEEDOSHOOOOO
and my frozen gun hand raises
slowly as the sun and points
amidst the always dying,
the drifting leaves
and the slow burn
and the quiet moment lasting eons of ageless time
at last it raises a clay-thick hand
and takes the cold metal from my cracked skin
offering the gun to the whispering pinewoods
as does a cat with a bird in its teeth—
the trees, gracious parents, take
their spindly needle fingers unspin screws
and the metal stands transformed,
and drops to the ground a perfect-shaped pinecone.
all questions gone from me, I stagger punch-drunk as a stupid boxer into the too-long arms
it smells like mold and soil, rot, and manure,
everything that dies to grow
and grows to die
my tears trickle into its mossy hair, and tiny leaves sprout up where they meet
sprout and grow, spread and leave
and crimson and auburn weaves a way through me
i can hear in his voice of thunder
running rivers
and growing moss
“BE AT PEACE CHILD OF THE LEAVES”