the yodel of a loon lingered

and for a time drowned out

the wheeze of a bad dream

still stuck in my throat

 

I kicked off my blankets and pulled back

the blinds enough to see a wedge

of the horizon through the trees

 

low hanging clouds the color of sparrows

smeared the sky with questions

 

rains had moved east across the lake

into a birch forest, to lonely ponds

and beaver dams, where echo’s

of frogs crowded the boggy air

 

past the trapper’s old log cabin

smothered by thickets, soggy

smelling of mold, bird’s nests

dotted the roof, inside bats hung

from rafters listening

for the wing-beats of mosquitoes

 

years later when I bring my wife

and kids down this memory

of a path, crashing through brush

with our fishing rods, canoes

and coolers stuffed with beer,

pop, and sandwiches

 

after we have brushed off

the twigs and black flies

from our sweaty necks and faces

after we have pushed off

onto the sleepy black water

after my first cast splashes safely

near the fallen pines

rotting along the shoreline

 

will I still be running away from America?