Islands

Islands

No man, you tell me, but everyman, I tell you,

and woman and boat, every Wisconsin farmhouse

and apartment in the Bronx; an island.

That blue circle of horizon, the dangerous passage,

those days the ferry cannot cross from my shores

to the quiet cove of yours.  The sea between.

~ Ralph Murre

That's the little tug Neverwas in my sketch above, departing Rock Island, Wisconsin, in the early afternoon of long ago, and getting a friendly wave from an unidentified guest at the Thordarson Boathouse, where Sharon Auberle and I were recently privileged to read to a sizable and receptive audience from our book Wind Where Music Was.  Headliner on the program was ferryman Richard Purinton, who was introducing his Thordarson and Rock Island, an absolute "must read" for anyone interested in the history of the region and the biography of the man.  I predict that this wonderfully researched volume will be the standard text on the topic for a long time to come.     ~ RM  

water's edge

long in its cradle

a weathered boat on the hard

a weathered sailor-man

on a green-painted bench

red sun in the west

~ arem

Insel und Halbinsel

a peninsula, it doesn't matter which one

a ferry boat at the end of it

the island of last chances out there somewhere

at the ticket office, a long queue

~ ralph murre

Blue Traveler

Steady, As Water

spring ice-out

the long lingered goodbye-ing

dusky dockside bar

Through air the color of the pigeons swimming in it (sulfur, foundry, tannery, coalpile, salt) and light as much from furnaces as from fluorescence in this backwater corner of a blackwater harbor, drunk with old wine and new love, the second mate swings up on deck; sleeps there. Tomorrow, there’ll be a farther horizon and, perhaps, a soaring bird without a name.

port-of-call

two perfumed letters

one from his wife

Sparse beard, watch-cap affectation, misfit among misfits, trickless coyote, would-be lone wolf, would-be sea dog; living and hating his dream, loving and hating its crew.  A woman here and there.  The threat of security, the security of the unknown.  Another day on the inland sea.  Another season.  The laughing gulls circling.

winter lay-up

irregular gait of sailors

friendly front street pub

~ Ralph Murre

Staggering

To that ancient white-tail buck we saw Saturday, south of Manitowoc, who is almost surely somewhere else today. You touched us deeply, Old Deer. (He's hiding in plain sight in my drawing, above.)

Great Stag, staggering
beneath weight of your years
told in antlers
weight of injury or infirmity
told in your gait
come down through that grass
this light
this November light

Cross the county road
yes, yes
cross and stumble a last time
to drink a last cool drink
of Lake Michigan
of this gold and silver light
Safe home
Old Father
good night

~Ralph Murre

Passage

from the carousel

different children waving

with every turn

~ arem

pilgrimage

come now

applaud with me

the ordinary magic

of sea and sky

and sand forever

and never changing

let us make a pilgrimage

of great faith

let us ring bells

and keep promises

~ ralph murre

Three Two One

Three Great Lakes, two mighty nations, and one aging and slightly quixotic gentleman astride his good motorcycle, Rozinante; that pretty much sets the stage and introduces the cast for the little play I gave for the last six days (two without rain!) and 1650 miles. Windmills encountered? Yeah, plenty of them now, but you want to think twice before charging at them. Have you seen the size of these things, up close? Still, I'm Netherlandish enough to love 'em. And while some are now being built offshore, I think they look and ARE rather benign compared with the other offshore energy misadventures going on. Made two very small and unavoidable purchases at BP stations on the trip; what can you do when your tank is low and the next gas available is fifty or more miles away? That's how it is in the North Country.

photographs of loons

show he's not the only one

in the rain today

~ Ralph Murre

I'm very proud to say that my poem "All Right" now appears in Mobius, the Journal of Social Change. Check it out (yes, that IS an order) at http://mobiusmagazine.com/

y' just might find y' get watcha need

What is Given

The likelihood of finding strawberries
tiny and wild and sweet
around your ankles
on any given day
in any given place
is not great
but sometimes
people find strawberries
right where they are standing
just because it is their turn
to be given a taste
of something wild and sweet

- Ralph Murre

Buoyancy

Yes, I'm aware that it's nowhere near "Thanksgiving", the day that is, with the capitol T, but it feels like a good time to offer a few words of appreciation anyway, to those that have given me the much needed buoyancy which got me through the winter, that dark season that tries to sink me. My friends, and you know who you are, both close at hand and far removed, have pulled me up time and again, and so has this peninsula, the home of my heart, the home of my bones. I give thanks daily for this place - its woods, its shores, a Great Lake, eagles, swans, coyotes, and crows - yet my thanks don't seem enough. We who live here pay a price, to be certain, in diminished earning potential, in high-priced goods, and in distances traveled to obtain certain bits of what we feel we need, but we reap a harvest of riches, too; dividends that feed the soul in a way very few places can, I think, and dividends that most people in cities not so far away are willing to pay dearly to try to grab a share of.

I can think of nothing better to say than simply, thank you, once again, to my friends and to my watery little corner of Earth, for getting me through to another Spring.

~ RM

Postcard

From Paradise

This minaret of dolomite, cold-water flat, artist’s garret of a peninsula appended to the broad side of my state, this bit of rock with life oozing from every fissure holds my heart, holds my thoughts, carries my prayers. Floats body and mind from fertile farms and second cities, away, into the cool of the lake. Here, to be a member in good standing of sunrise and set, to be part of rainbow’s arc and thunderhead’s roll.

Here, too, the rush of commerce, the haul-it-in, haul-it-out retailing of the gross world product in the shapes of lighthouses, gull-like geegaws and fishing boat fol-de-rol. Lodgers in plaid shorts replace loggers in plaid shirts. Where cedars live on rock and hope, and trilliums announce the season, signs of spring also include “for sale”, “private beach”, and “own the dream”. We’ll each buy an acre and mark its corners with bright ribbons, to show one another where the dream ends.

in a leaking boat
someone from paradise
rowing hell-bent

- Ralph Murre

first published, in this form, online at Haibun Today

Age, That Sneaky Bastard

Is there anything that can bring you up short quite like seeing an old acquaintance or an old love after the passage of a number of years? Recently, on a drive that crossed Milwaukee's Kinnickinnic River Bridge, on South First Street, I glanced down river and was surprised to see just such an old acquaintance -- The ex U.S.E.P.A. "Roger R. Simons", ex U.S.C.G. "Maple" -- as I live and breathe, partially hidden around a bend, painted as I'd never seen her, ill-kempt, if kempt at all, but unmistakeably HER. (I know how odd it is to think of anything named "Roger" as her, but that's not today's discussion.)

When I sailed the Simons in 1976, just after receiving my sea card, she was already old, having been retired from Coast Guard service and having been pressed into use by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency, for which we worked, indirectly, doing a series of research projects on Lake Michigan. We brought the little ship up to a sparkling, if dated, appearance when the company for which I worked lost their government contract due to some fluke in the language of bid-letting. I left her with great reluctance.

I saw the ship a few times after that, once when she was being refit in Sturgeon Bay, and later, up in Superior, where she was a display at the Barker's Island maritime museum for some time. Then she disappeared from that port and I assumed she'd been ignominiously treated, probably by men with cutting torches. Imagine my shock then, to see her still afloat, but bearing no name, no recent paint, her many ports covered with plywood, and generally ratty, but still with what I have always considered to be a sort of peasant-girl's beauty.

I was taken aback to see how she'd aged, until I looked in a mirror.

~ Ralph Murre
Yours truly, with deck-hand Dave Hagen, if I remember correctly; in a photo probably snapped by the mate, Larry Van Deusen. 1976.

Boating in the Stream of Consciousness

I was photographing off Sherwood Point today, which of course got me to thinking about Sherwood Forest which of course got me to thinking about Robin Hood et al. Was there ever a boy who didn't identify with Old Rob, I wonder? Ever one who did identify with the Sheriff of Nottingham? Of course, both Mr. Hood and the Evil Fuzz lusted after Maid Marian, and though most of us were not fully aware of the nature of lust at the time we were reading these tales, we were pretty sure we wanted some . . . . But back to my premise about wanting to follow the lead of the merry bandit rather than the bad cop; if I'm right about the almost universal instinct of impressionable lads to side with the outlaw, (and American lore has its share of scofflaw heroes, too, including most of our founders and present-day leaders), then how do kids turn into cops? Or tax collectors? Even we tax & spend liberal pinkos hate tax collectors, although the collection of taxes made it possible to build the lighthouse that is so important to my photograph, which I made from across the bay, from a park and marina which was acquired and built with tax money. Even though I was able to be there because I'm receiving my social security, I still hate tax collectors. And the constabulary.

It's great to be able to say that my piece, "U.P. North", from a few posts back, now appears in the August issue of the excellent web mag, "Quill and Parchment", which is put together by Sharmagne Leland-St. John. You'll have to subscribe to get full access, but the magazine is well worth it. Take a (free) peek at the archives at http://quillandparchment.com/

Another Side

The photo shows another side of the Keweenaw Peninsula, and has nothing whatsoever to do with another side of my writing, which I am proud to say appears at the excellent Haibun Today site, and to which this link may direct you >>> http://www.haibuntoday.com/ <<< (go there now)

~ RM

The Greatest

While I live about 100 yards from a perfectly acceptable Great Lake, every now and then I take it in mind to go feel the cool breath of THE GREATEST. And the breath of Mother Superior was indeed cool this time. Set off yesterday on my mighty Rozinante at about 1:00 PM and rode ~ spent the night in Jim Harrison country ~ and was home by 3:30 PM today. Slew no dragons, didn't even see windmills. There were lighthouses. Derelict vessels. A really big lake. There was cold and rain, in tolerable doses. There was food and drink in tolerable doses.

a motorcycle

in the Michigan morning

of blossoms and rain

So why ride well over 500 miles to spend so little time with the object of my affection? The ride, my friends, the ride. It is a new season, and I rode to where it is even newer, backing up time just a little bit. That's enough for me.

~ RM

Sunlight and Old Ice

What have I got to say about this image of the long-resting bay getting ready to cast off her heavy winter quilt, about the way the sun flirts with her, will gently kiss her moist body when she awakens? Nothing. Sometimes words, or at least, my abilities to use words, add nothing at all.

~ RM

Cool Fishin'

It's been cool hereabouts, in a seasonal sort of way, but hopped up into the twenties for a few days. When I took the photo above, however, it was well below zero (yes, that's Fahrenheit) and the little gill-net boat was working in some pretty good ice as she came home off of the big lake. There are still some tough hombres around, and you can count Great Lakes fishermen among them.

Here's a piece for cool sailing:

Frostbit

In this sea of dimlit winter
with its dark currents pulling
to the far-flung isles of madness
through the dozen shoals of sadness
where my spirit jibes awild
in a goosewing careless way

Here the rusted craft are travelin'
with their triple-reefs unravelin'
and their drunken sailors jigging
as the rigging is a-screamin'
with a demon wind a-running
in its cunning
in its cunning
in its howling down the bay

And the lonely are in danger
as the leeward rail goes under
in the thunder of their vices
as they slowly throw the dice
at what they may

And the stalwart lads are climbin'
far aloft above the seas
and a-low the rest are pleadin'
(although no one hears their pleas)
and their knees
they are a-bleedin'
from the kneelin'
from the kneelin'
and they're prayin' now for healin'
as the frigid night goes stealin'
toward another frigid day

- Ralph Murre

Final Notice

now that I have jumped

there is news that they've cancelled

the swimming lesson

- arem

Before the Ice

pewter and gold sky

over this mercurial sea

metal on metal

- arem

The Light, Again

look back once again

this light upon this water

the call of islands

- arem