“…a proposed limestone mine located near environmentally sensitive areas…”

–“Green Lake County sued over Skunk Hollow Mine,” Ripon Press, August 18th, 2022

 

I don’t know from experience

because I will never grow old enough

 

How creeping water paves a place

like smoke filling a cave, metal filings like dust on stone

 

Sometimes you don’t need to know someone

to tell they are in distress; it’s their breathing,

the way they look, what people say

they want to do to them

 

Sometimes I scrape stone against stone

or throw one into the water

just to hear it dollop and sink

 

Sometimes it is the case

that the more I am out in the world

the more hesitant I am to mine it —

 

(When I was panicked, you moved your hand

from my temple to the place behind my ear

and made a sound like cattails

 

Then, we took a walk

on a gravel road of crushed limestone)

 

Think about a raccoon 17,000 years ago

scratching out a depression

 

Think of what it must be like to be full of water

that whole time

 

Think of this depression

filling with water finely

 

Think about it from kayak and cornfield

or only from the road