“Body of well-known naturalist found in river”
A woman wanders to escape. Her noetic life has dwindled
. . . . . . . .down to grandchildren she never sees and a failure to remember
their names. She retains an ossified memory of the taxonomy of birds,
. . . . . . . .but has lost her car keys for the last time. She miss-mates the buttons
on her flannel jacket. There is no one to straighten it or care,
. . . . . . . .no one to straighten her affairs —
not the trysts of mid-life, but the sort that bury you under piles of junk
. . . . . . . .in your seventies. Physically, she is strong with steady heart
and unburnt lungs; she can hike for hours wielding a hand-carved
. . . . . . . .walking stick, backpack not a burden, canvas for shade or to lie upon,
enough water for a day. She roams the path along the river where she knows
. . . . . . . .the flora and the pitch of bird calls.
The once-weekly chat with her daughter came this morning
. . . . . . . .at ten. She no longer looks forward to these calls, but does her best
to fake it. Pleasantries were tendered and repaid. No hint
. . . . . . . .was given of any plan or prayer. In the river, tiny eyelets open
within eddies as she slides from bank to current with a splash.
. . . . . . . .She is a perfect pear-shaped sea-bound droplet.
Editor’s note: At first, I balked at noetic (“of or relating to mental activity or the intellect”), but upon further reading, I found some lovely internal rhyme and alliteration in this poem.
11 thoughts on ““Body of well-known naturalist found in river” by Risa Denenberg”
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This one hits close to home. Especially like “ossified memory” (immediately thinking of MRI images of Alzheimer’s brains).
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Steve, thanks for reading. I hadn’t thought of MRI images and Alzheimer’s, but that is a great image. My mind jumped to “fossil” after reading “ossified,” as the sounds are similar.
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I’m loving the noetic life. It hints at nomadic and poetic at once, all the while having a specific definition. The sense of a final walkabout carries through this poem. Outstanding poem to kick off this daily project.
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Thanks for stopping by! I, too, enjoyed the narrative of this poem: it encompasses the life lived, as well as the life ending.
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Lovely poem, also pounced on noetic–but more like a raven would a sudden sparkle.
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Glad you liked it, Whit. And I’m glad “noetic” didn’t keep me from posting this poem.
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Sad. Beautiful. Thanks.
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Thanks for reading. 🙂
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Remarkably swift current to take one out of the eddies and back into the poised singular direction of the deluge of extracating ones-selves from the tethers that bind, great poem!
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the irony of the well-known naturalist forgetting much of her life is a sweet beginning for me.
and then the fruition, the accomplishment of entering the river and becoming a perfect pear-shaped sea-bound droplet!! it’s a life’s ending any of us might hope for.
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thank you! This was a found poem from a headline that read the same as the title. I always wondered if the naturalist intended to die or if it was an accident. And so a poem began . . .
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