Canadians
We have an unborn vision
pushing along the bloodstream.
We can’t say what it is;
it’s unshaped, and we only curse a little
when it boils along, spoiling to get out.
An oldtimer says, “I remember ’23,
moved up to the Forks then. Built a little farm.”
Or, “There were salmon in that river
thick as berries in Spring.”
And another talks about the Depression,
the prairie dust swirling over the hood
of his Chevrolet;
or a Vet of the First War
will tell you how the Canadians
got so fed up with Paschandaele mud
they went up to Amiens and gave Hindenburg
his “Dark Day.” Usually, though, it’s the place.
“I don’t know—we built and laboured along
And there was no rain.” And far away
stood the ramparts of the Rockies.
“You can see them on a clear day…”
even on a moonlit night far out under
wild wings. There stand in all people’s minds
these significant things:
the forest parting before the river,
the smell of cedar at dawn,
the sweat, and the flies, and the gasping…
Lake Ontario in Autumn blowing its waves
into the St. Lawrence, the leaves in flame,
and the grim rock of Huron…Strange
and alone, the north’s lunar landscape,
like a dream without any name.