Across alluvial flat, I move toward
places that rise and
sing themselves into my mouth,
rosary of steeple and field:
Saint Benoit du Lac,
Sainte Catherine de Hatley,
Ange Gardien.
Through soft dust
a humming tractor tells the beads of
Rock Forest,
Owl’s Head,
Ayer’s Cliff.
Lesser hills kneel to the dome of
Orford, queen of this high heaven.
Tidal rhythms of
Massawippi,
Memphremagog
pull me from mapled pastures.
I climb the long Katevale road.
Fields fall away
from the height of land,
rivers change their flow
from east to west.
The hill plunges down to Little Lake,
wind-ruffled, sun-blessed,
as I sing the hymn of names.
