A five or ten minute trip between two towns:
I make the drive almost daily,
often without thought or attention.

A five or ten minute trip between two towns:
yesterday, transformed.

We parked the cars and pulled on tall boots
(not tall enough, at times, for the stream ran deep)
and put in a canoe, with equipment
(not necessary, at times, for the stream ran dry)
and searched the stream for evidence
of its human past.
We looked for long-forgotten traces
of water mills along the creek.

We found a few sites, noted their coordinates,
jotted a few notes on a waterproof pad,
took a few photos with a digital camera.
Men had, indeed, used that stream once,
altered its course for their own devices.
We learned from what they left behind,
rotting timbers and a stone dam
the water now pours through.
The stream outran those men,
having far more to say than they.

We carried the canoe over beaver dams,
dragged it through the dry gravel where
(was it possible?) the stream ran out
for a moment, and its bed seemed to lead uphill.
We paddled under fallen logs, lying flat
at the bottom of the canoe as bark brushed our faces.
We floated in endless pools of fallen leaves,
impossible to gauge their depth
(we got wet more than once).

We saw deer and ducks, kingfishers,
minnows and small fish, pawprints in the mud,
cattle and dogs, but never another person.

We were shivering when we pulled out,
six hours after we put in,
having translated a five or ten minute trip
into all that daylight gave us.
It was dark and cold, but I was sorry to leave.

All along the stream, trees had guarded the banks,
their roots clinging (literally) for dear life.
I wanted to stay with those trees, to hang on to the stream
for a hundred years or more, though I was cold and wet
on a mid-November evening.
Today, only my water-logged boots kept me away,
stayed me from seeking again
my reflection on the still water.