VERMONT FLOODWATER

by Melanie Choukas-Bradley

 

Shot on an angle by their dad from behind

My great niece and nephew stand in silence on a bridge over the Winooski River

Dressed for Taekwondo in red and white

Boy with hand on concrete rail, girl in form-ready pose

 

They are frozen in the video, like children in a painting

As the wild Winooski race-churns below, disregarding streets

Down from the mountains, wild brook to wild river, a New England water rodeo

Riding Vermont farm, village and town, with too much water from too much rain

 

Ten days ago their grandmother, my sister, texted a photo of Camel’s Hump

Wreathed in Canadian wildfire smoke, yesterday a video of her playful stream in murder mode

Tiny Vermont, in the climate crosshairs

Hill and hamlet no longer safe retreat

 

During Irene I watched the covered bridge of my childhood

Die an animal death on national television, falling wounded in seconds

I grew up drinking sap from the bucket

And long for the sweetness of Old Vermont

 

Melanie Choukas-Bradley is a naturalist and award-winning author of seven nature books, including City of Trees,  A Year in Rock Creek Park, Finding Solace at Theodore Roosevelt Islan,d and The Joy of Forest Bathing. She began writing poetry during the pandemic and has had several poems published by Beate Sigriddaughter’s Writing in a Woman’s Voice, including “How to Silence a Woman,” and “If I have loved you,” both of which won “Moon Prizes.” Earlier this year The New Verse News published her poem The Water Cooler following multiple mass shootings. Melanie grew up in Vermont wandering the woods and fields, and her heart aches for her family and friends who are dealing with catastrophic flooding in Vermont.

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