Fireplace and Wine: 15 Canoe Poems for Winter

Fireplace and Wine

  15 Canoe Poems for Winter

  By Lenny Everson

  Illustrations by Lois Foell and Lenny Everson

  rev 1

  Copyright Lenny Everson 2011

  For Dianne, my paddle-partner

  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

  ****

  Contents

  Christmas is Coming

  Popcorn Paradise

  The Long December Night

  Maps. February

  The Devious Canoeist in February

  It’s Dark at Second Portage

  The Sweatered Grouch

  January Paddling Lesson

  Light

  In January I at Last

  A Deep and Secret Blue

  The Christmas List

  The Route We Once Traced

  February Canoeist

  Chasing Dreams in January

  ***

  Christmas is Coming

  the canoe was slipping sideways

  headed for some cosmological union of

  serpentine currents and

  rock of ages

  I wedged the paddle between

  rock and rock, defying

  four vectors of physics and

  the water’s idea of predestination

  even taped, the paddle

  has never been the same

  all I ever saved

  was a canoe

  but Christmas is coming again...

  and I sure could use a new paddle

  ***

  Popcorn Paradise

  There’s snow upon Algonquin’s lakes

  The landscape deep in diamond flakes

  Drifting snow with cold conspires

  And every sleeping pine tree shakes

  In February, our main desires

  Are wine, and cheese, and cozy fires

  The dazzle of the ‘fridge’s light

  Are all this winter route requires

  No doubt the northland’s cold and white

  No doubt the wolves are curled up tight

  But our kitchen’s a popcorn paradise

  And has anyone fed the cat tonight?

  Algonquin’s lakes and streams are nice

  But hard to canoe when they’re solid ice

  So we’ll leave the lakes to cold and storm

  Ah, it’s fine to feel so warm!

  ***

  The Long December Night

  The lake’s now closed with crystal

  And topped with drifting snow

  The loon long gone, the only life

  Swims cold, and far below

  Where I beached my red canoe

  The snow fills tracks of fox

  Where I cooked fish on open fire

  Only winter walks

  The portage trail’s deserted

  A trace of white on white

  Nothing moves but falling snow

  The long December night

  ***

  Maps. February.

  In February the maps come out

  Are pinned upon the floor

  And I with wine and quiet talk

  Trace lines of lakes once more

  The world tonight is cold and white

  The map stays green and blue

  And every lake’s a route I take

  In thought, with my canoe

  This winter night canoes are light

  The days forever shine

  And a tent unfolds by waterfalls

  On every thin blue line.

  ***

  The Devious Canoeist in February

  Ah, but I’m devious, making my plans

  With the parallel truth of a map

  And this time of year, you cannot suspect

  You’re walking right into my trap

  Now you’re making muffins with raisins and bran

  The world’s in a Pleistocene grip

  But I’ve got a scheme with sometime and sun

  And I’m carefully writing the script

  I’ve discovered a lake that we’ve never seen

  Plotted a green rendezvous

  Long shadows panel the February dark

  But I’m already in summer with you

  ***

  It’s Dark at Second Portage

  It’s dark at second portage, now

  The snow increasing deep

  As evening comes, a stand of birch

  Seems carved in winter sleep

  A porcupine plows across the path

  Intent on changing trees

  Two grosbeaks fluff their feathers

  To December’s mortal breeze

  A rabbit pauses by the rock

  Where I rested months ago

  And listens for the owl’s wings

  Above the sound of snow

  It’s dark at second portage, now

  The forest claimed by night

  The place I knew is now defined

  By shades of black, on white

  ***

  The Sweatered Grouch

  Late winter, the cat is wary

  Of the indigenous sweatered grouch

  Noisily chewing on low-fat food

  On an old and flowered couch

  This is a creature of the woods?

  That's what we were told

  Now restlessly, he dens himself

  Against a little cold

  Channel, channel, he TVs the scales

  Then back to channel two

  Outside, the wind shakes the eaves

  And whistles in the flue

  A pause in the faces flashed and gone

  Upon the glowing screen

  Is he dead – the cat looks up

  – Ah – no – a canoeing scene.

  ***

  January Paddling Lesson

  Hold the paddle like this - yes

  Lean forward on the stroke...

  The evenings in January fall

  On dreamer and wife alike

  This is called a type of pry

  And this, the basic "reach"

  Reach - reach into the fluids your ancestors left

  Crawling up to dryness and glare

  From the Caesarean cleft of paddle and pull

  In moving, we live

  Reach for a weekend of black rock and pine

  Gypsy days long on the lakes

  Reach into water, coil and swirl

  To suck down air, weeks, months, years

  Till falling dusk

  Calls us to camp

  Till falling leaves

  Call us home

  Call us home

  Pry, pry from the rocks where lizards sunned

  Watching the world turning green

  Pry from caged days behind glass

  Places protected from rain on your skin

  Pry to salvation from sharp sinful scrape

  Find the good flow, find the best flow

  Pry the bow, turn under the skies

  To pass safely through, weeks, months, years

  Till falling dusk

  Calls us to camp

  Till falling leaves

  Call us home

  Call us home

  Pry...

  Oh...

  Sorry. I get a bit carried away.

  Hold the paddle like this....

  ***

  Light

  In the evenings, the fireplace

  Makes light again

  I think light repeats endlessly

  On this planet
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  The light that scatters on the

  Small bow waves of my canoe

  Is returned through the leaves on

  The following portage

  Lines the amber leaf and twig

  Comes blinding on banks

  Of February snow

  And icicles dazzling the porch

  And a small fire

  That was and will be

  Out past Heron Lake

  I remembered the loon call

  And the fish making noise

  At dusk, at dusk

  Pour another glass of sherry

  Put some more light on the fire.

  ***

  In January I at Last

  In January, I at last

  Get out the maps from season past

  And trace the routes I did not take

  Every cancelled creek and lake

  While the snow is soft and deep

  While the world appears to sleep

  I remember raincoats, weekends lost

  Workdays when I mourned the cost

  But now I grin, because I know

  That there will be an end to snow

  That those azure lakes will lie

  Below the coming summer’s sky

  And I and my canoe will find

  What we never left behind

  ***

  A Deep and Secret Blue

  It’s all water, this falling snow

  However still it looks

  This glacial mortuary

  Is springtime’s dancing brooks

  The January hills recharge

  The waters I canoe

  The shadows of the snowbound hills

  Are deep and secret blue

  There hides, in every mounding drift

  In every diamond flake

  The sparkle on some summer stream

  The surge upon some lake

  ***

  The Christmas List

  What I’d like for Christmas gifts

  I’m not that tough to please

  I’ve always got a lengthy list

  So set your mind at ease

  Some days, always downwind

  Out past known and known

  A lake beyond a range of hills

  Where we can be alone

  A campsite by the water’s edge

  Firewood plenty and dry

  A loon to watch us paddle in

  A couple of fish to fry

  A full moon to... oh dear!

  Why the heavy sigh?

  I really need... some warmer gloves

  And... of course another tie

  ***

  The Route We Once Traced

  The snowmobiles have found the route

  Canoe and I once traced

  The first one up my lonesome lake

  Has peacefulness erased

  The ice-hut fellows drink their beer

  Where I met summer loon

  And lay dead fish upon the waves

  Once silver with the moon

  To this canoeist, January

  Is fireplace and wine

  For all that snow is bound for rivers

  That will in spring be mine

  ***

  February Canoeist

  “Great day for canoeing”, they mock

  The snow scudding past the factory windows and

  The thermometer into double negatives

  But I’ve canoed more rivers in February than

  I ever got to in summer.

  While the company’s paying me by the hour

  While others poke at this week’s deadlines

  I’m lining a canoe down Otter Creek, in my mind

  I’m drifting downwind on Sparkler Lake

  I’m two hours to campsite

  Three hours to campfire

  Only a thin hull from the depths

  Only a glass daydream from the truth

  ***

  Chasing Dreams in January

  On the way up a portage trail

  My skis sliiiiip a just bit

  And I check the slope with mittened hands

  Pawing twenty feet of it

  And scout some awkward summer steps

  When I go back to find my mitt

  Can’t be too careful, you know

  Looks fine to me; I’ll return

  When the hill’s a somewhat greener place

  When January’s degrees seem heavenly

  To the sweat sliding down my face

  I fasten ski-poles to my wrists

  And create a caterpillar track

  Envying some future summer self

  World in a dumpy canvas pack

  Stepping up this same steep slope

  Canoe upon my summer back

  *** END ***

  Lenny Everson [email protected] or Google “Lenny Everson”