Open to the sky
by Susan Smith
(in response to a painting by David Rose entitled "Ripple Pond")

The eye of the pond
pulls down the sky,
projects the changing season upon it —

reeds of winter, dry and rustling
or sodden in rot,
the margins of willow and cedar,
alder scrub starting to leaf.

A raw spring wind
strokes along the water
and wrinkles reflected colours
toward the windward shallows,
stretches the lee to gleam.

Amid the echoes
of cardinal and blackbird,
rubber boots
suck slow
along the path flooded with sky.

The old man comes at last
to check if winter slumped his fence,
built once for the children
and against some neighbouring cows,
since this pond was neither
pool nor trough
but wilder,

left to leech and tadpole,
a scavenging marten or two,
the black muck bottom
an archive
of nearly a century.

Once more he sees his father
frown and take back
the forked sapling
lying dead
in his own small hands,

gapes once more
as the twig tip bows to earth
a whisper
between the knotted fingers of the wizard
who feels the pumping heart
that would fill this pond.