Locked In - April 4 2024

 

Locked In

April 4 2024



The sound of flowing water

after the world’s been locked in ice

for month after month.

We walk the muddy path

that runs beside the creek

excited by the sound.

But worried, as well,

as the heedless dogs

darting everywhere

ignore my urgent calls,

risk slipping in

to the fast moving flow.

The tinkling and bubbling

as the creek opens up

is as hopeful a sound

as the laughter and banter

on the playground next door,

the lively hubbub

of high-pitched voices

when school lets out.

Who have also been locked in,

confined to stuffy classrooms

fidgeting in their chairs

for uncountable months.

And now, as uncontained as spring

and with summer soon to come.

Although when you’re that young

nothing is soon;

time seems bottomless

and seasons infinite

when you’re impatient to grow up

but stuck being a kid

for what seems like forever.

I feel the opposite.

That time is speeding up

and seasons getting shorter,

while looking back

the years seem to merge.

Memory

unreliable at any age.

So while the sound of running water

is encouraging, this time of year

I'm also vaguely disturbed.

Why the hurry, after all?

Where’s it going

in such a rush?

But also hopeful

that no matter what

the creek still runs;

even after a warm dry winter

replenishing itself.

Just as generations of kids

have succeeded each other

year after year;

the playground always full,

their voices as exuberant.

And how, as pent-up pressure gives way,

they explode

out the double doors

as the recess bell strikes.

Like frothing torrent

of wild water

when an ice dam bursts.

The dog stuff is more a self-indulgent tangent than essential to the poem: a good editor would probably insist it be cut. But it’s where the poem started — on a walk just like that — and I find that the first person viewpoint draws the reader in, while the dryly descriptive is too bloodless and detached: it’s the difference between whispering in her ear and a list of adjectives.

The ending is as much a memory of going to choose my dog and watching the breeder open the kennel to its double cohort of chocolate Lab litters (yes, one planned and one accidental that happened to overlap): a million irresistibly adorable little pups exploding out into the yard. One of whom was my beloved Rufus. Still cute as hell!