For Gordon Lightfoot

Out there in the dire hinterlands, a vastness ebvelopes tropes of yesterday, that will never be held again. This wildness is not derivative; its real, winding through a caligraphy of rocks, like patterns placed with color in mind. Urgencies of dryness causes the rain to behave as unknowing saviors, bringing to the surface all probable memories that can be conjured or curated. Rivers, rising to loud salutations, deny they are the true obstacle courses, the true trails sought only by the self-contained. None of this is dispositive of inner fights; the inside and outside of life. Tha canoe you navigate skirts the currents, like lyrics against the ravages of unformed tastes; not so anodyne deceits. A presense will remain. The impact, unforced. Dipped into the Nahanni, our eyesights are cleansed by a fresh rush of purity.