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from Walking Around Brentwood, New Hampshire

Eleanor Nudd 


2.

We start out, two grey-haired women
wearing sweaters against the chilly air. 
You go ahead as usual, setting the pace
along a road we both know well, pine
woods on one side, alfalfa field the other, 
and where suburbia obtrudes a house and
where the horse farm guards the last 
of open countryside, you say, "Let's go
down to the river." We turn aside
from houses, paddock, black-topped road, 
into an alleyway between the walnut trees. 
We feel leaf-mold beneath our feet, kick 
empty shells the squirrels have left, 
stumble on projecting roots. The path 
downhill turns to a stone-filled rut
washed out by long-past springtime rains. 
The makeshift bridge across the 
dried-out gulch shakes underfoot. You say, 
"This isn't the river," sounding betrayed 
as though the land had somehow slipped
a jigsaw piece into your mental map. 
Not knowing the trail, I say, "Perhaps
a little farther on." We are laconic, 
having no need to state our reasons
for walking down a dead-end road
to stare at running water. The river, 
when we reach it, runs through myth, 
the haunted center of the woods. Upstream, 
its wide and uneventful waters lie
pond-like between the banks. We stand
on a thin plank that's meant to be a bridge
and, underneath, the river narrows to 
a dark disturbance frothing over rocks
before it disappears among the pines. 
We start back up the hill, going slowly. 
I hurry past you, watching where I step 
among the stones and gullies. When we come 
out of the trees, you catch me up again. 
You say, "Either you're getting younger
or I am slowing down." We laugh, pleased
by this or by the welcome of the sunlight. 
We pace each other on the last lap home.
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