Wisconsin Summer

Rambler sits sagging on old foundation cracked badly but fixed up from the fifties. Wilted little woodshed back off pushed to the property lines where once barbed fence fits neatly into the weeds. fades into the woods and into tomorrow. Time has forgotten these people's lives but the world waits forever. i'll watch and drive by.

Manure and musty smells staple of midwestern summer. Damp and stink stands piles of stuff on garage floor in which past lives of mice made nests from old newspapers piled up and nestled in the corners of cardboard boxes.

The sun just sits and bleeds.

And a middle age mother wears the worry on her weathered face

when the world burns who will watch? With god gone lost in the minds of the men made makers. With books made biblical like beacons of hope to hopeless and even hopeless is nothing but gone.

Ashes in air

Superior Hiking Trail

Duluth is down south of us now and indifferent. After waiting while danny worked and thru traffic out of the city we're singing along somewhere on 61. the day dimmed slightly clouds up overhead and a few drops down onto the windshield but not much more than that. We smile and talk and loud music with louder thoughts for the weekend. Silver bay comes up from someplace and sits back from the lake on the hills. North shore mining is big-business with bad ethics stands smirking over the water. We pass and look up rusted at repetative and robotic pours piles of taconite off into the world. Times have changed but tomorrows can't always forget the evils of the past. Fuck pollution. just past silver bay we pull off sharp right into dirt roads dust in the rearview. Down a little further on single lane service roads I turn around and park at a place we've both been. We're out and with gear off road and onto foot-path follow it down to the water. Black sand pebble beach pushes out to a point where big rock island stands twenty maybe thirty feet up. Boulders like buildings lay scattered at the base and out into the lake. The lake is superior and scene is like fiction blue water bright sun and a belief that the world goes on forever. It does and we sit to take it all as the sun sits just up over the trees. Time is a togetherness with the world that we both realize and while that happens we set up camp. Tents up under the shadows of rock tower flat face with names etched of people and of the past. Danny takes trips to the truck to bring instruments and a big canvas bag of food. We cook right at the campsite on little coleman cook-top. Feast fully with pasta white beans and stewed tomatoes all together and steaming in a pot. We eat then sit thoughtful sip wine thick red merlot from coffee cups and warms us while we wait. Danny leaves then comes back carries bow-saw drops big tree smiling just past sunset. We dig a little pit in the rocks and soon spread blankets out by the fire. Sparks fly up and flicker out as the moon starts to swim up and seemingly right out of superior. Reflections stretch oblong out across cold calming waters. He strums a little and sings a song while I feed flames then get the big wooden drum. Sit on afgan and sing rhythmically along with him. It rolls back and forth reasons with waking the spirits. Some time later and some more logs burned out on the fire we just sit and drink beers kept cold in the lake. During the dark we drift and talk about everything. i'm laying back laughing head propped up on the drum looking up loving at the night. Danny tells stories and too soon we've rolled out sleeping bags right on the sand. Somehow i'll be there forever, sleeping on that beach in early summer.

Day breaks dawn and soon after I wake stretch and gaze out. Danny is long sleeved in morning cool little figure lost about mid beach in sunshine straight on. And thru sunglasses he sees the world and sees me awaken so slowly gets up and walks over. I'm into the world out of sleeping bags cocoon that held minds captive in dreams and in warmth. I neck crack in the cold and shudder out to the fire get camp stove cooking hot and boil water for oats. Danny's all excited somehow in sunrise and pictures he took all morning while I slept so we talk over the stove with oatmeal simmers and smells godly and good he's got coffee ready too I fill my cup.

We're soon off. Gear packed up and put back into the pick-up smiling behind sunglasses too and the wheel I drive back into town. Little midwestern movie set perfect place in the north but its just silver bay and something about this place reminds of a sinister past. We forget about that and about fears of futures and find ourselves hiking up trails on some bluffs above town. And gaze out towards the lake; way off now back to the south and to the east a faded blue bends into the sky and simply unbelievable as a body of water. We wonder about whatever and keep walking trails.