No Place We Never Go
The ephemeral stream beside
my house holds treasures.
It’s rocky bed lined with generations of
junk woven between rocks and roots
🎶Take it out back and dump it in the river🎶
Spring rains reveal buttons, springs,
hubcaps, handles, and shards of old dishes
🎶Take it out back and throw it in the woods🎶
washed down from the old smokehouse or
unburied from the banks where it was cast
forgotten for ages as moss covered stones
and trees grew tall around the edges.
🎶Take it out back and chuck it down the hillside🎶
One time, my kids uncovered an entire
Pyrex casserole dish intact while digging
for gold along the stream path as
part of some game.
🎶Keep the front yard looking good🎶
They gifted it to me, I bleached it
clean and still use it to make cobblers.
🎶Lyrics from “Take It Out Back” by Chuck Brodsky
10 thoughts on "No Place We Never Go"
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I like how your descriptions of the junk include shards of broken dishes, as if nothing of value could possibly have been found here, only for an intact dish to come in and round out the poem. A very well-written poem.
Thank you! Sometimes, life offers us these perfect, small moments of wonder.
I love how you wove the lyrics into your poem, Amy! I’ll have to go listen to the song. And landing on the image of a cobbler in the found pyrex feels so perfect.
Thank you! I’ve had that song on my mind lately.
Never know what’s on the edges of those rivers, or what’s below our own feet!
WHO would bury a nice Pyrex dish??
Great to be here with you again.
I’m surprised that dish survived the torrents of rain and uprooting trees. So many others are in pieces. I believe they were Channing’s mamaw’s from the old smokehouse that fell into the creek years ago.
PS Great to be here with you as well!
I love the title of this piece and the way the song lyrics work.
Thank you!
I love the artifact of the Pyrex casserole being “buried” at the end for us to find: a little treasure.