Merrimack River Nows — selected - Jan 2014

Jan 1

ice sheets in continental collision—silver shards thrust-faulting into fantastic arctic mountain ranges—a geologic era now taking seconds

Jan 6

fog, like a conceptual identity, lifts, and the silver waterway is there, as it always is, open, spontaneous, and never the same river twice

Jan 14

rain falls, fog forms, and the river appears to disappear on the way out to sea—sometimes i get a great notion to jump in the current and be

Jan 15

scintillating ice stars in a sky of river

Jan 17

sparkling high water has made this low-lying reach a no man’s land—the yawp of geese, laughter of ducks, rushes of being

Jan 22

a tugboat fragments polar vortex ice—an eagle’s wings divine the mystic currents

Jan 24

stopping by the roadside on an open bluff above a frozen river in zero degree wind chill sunshine, i grasp the raw stillness—changing a tire

Jan 26
in the wind-swept mirror of perfect ice—eastern white pines

Jan 27

reflections on thin ice—shadows and light—an engine of wind—sounds like shattering glass—the scrape of a leaf—absolutely no one is here now

Jan 29

ice floes leaving the mouth of the river like words defining infinity

Jan 31

black and white notions relentlessly swarming in confusion—feeding the seagulls