revealing urban waters

a moment later my first poem began. What touched it off? I think I know without any wind blowing the sheer weight of a raindrop shining in parasitic luxury on a cordate leaf caused its tip to dip and what looked like a globule of quick silver performed a sudden glissando down the center vein and then having shed its bright load the bright leaf unbent Tip.leaf.dip relief. The instant it took to happen seemed to me not so much a fraction of time as a fissure in it, a missed heartbeat which was refunded at once by a patter of rhymes; I say patter intentionally for when a gust of wind did come,the trees would briskly start to drip all together in as crude an imitation of the stanza I was already muttering resembled the shock of wonder when for a moment heart and leaf had been one.

sanctuary....collection.....observation.....PAVILLION.....transformation




The revelation of the river depends not on the introduction and exposure of existing water beneath the surface of Mill Creek but rather on the creation of rippling surface of light and shadow and of a humid tumescence of air. Just as the presence of water transforms a place, so will a series of small collecting machines and pavilions. They will provide shelter from rain and sun and become a place from which nature can be observed. At the same time, they will acknowledge the TRANSFORMATIVE role that water plays in the landscape of earth, trees, and the human body. A dynamic of movement and shifting of light and shadow and sound will mark the route of the river. I feel that the physical form of the pavilions and the means by which water is collected must become emblematic of the river and draw attention to its interrment and the loss of flowing water in the Mill Creek neighborhood.

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