The path divides. We come to a standstill.
Do we stay the course? Or, continue
the loop, deeper into the Great Gully trail?
Aidan is bored with old trees and erratics.
He darts ahead to get back
to the car. I hem and haw, want to
prolong our walk together in this forest
that shields us. I want to push away
hard truth of timescale.
That, like life, nothing in the forest
remains undisturbed. Furious, his rant
storms the air. Years ago,
a microburst tore through these
woods, opened them to light.
Up sprang rich weaves of grass and
wildflowers, a new generation of saplings.
Pioneer species, migratory birds, all now
full-fledged. I join him, always will.
As we both are joined to my son.
Disturbance and regeneration,
part of the cycle. In the future,
Aidan may stop to ponder
how the old give way in his
own interweave of growth and loss
—
Blaine Marchand lives on the unceded territory of the Algonquin – Anishnabe people, known as the Ottawa Valley. His poetry and prose have appeared in Canada, the US, New Zealand, Pakistan, India, France, and Ukraine. He has seven books of poetry published, a chapbook, a children’s novel and a work of non-fiction. Active in the literary scene in Ottawa for over 50 years, he was President of the League of Canadian Poets from 1991-1993.
