Friday poem

The Lake

The mist spreads across the early morning lake like a mild rumor.

We are here, the dog and I,

because we have no other place to be, up early and no one else awake in the small cabin.

The air itself still half asleep,

no birds yet to tell it to get moving, there's a storm to carry in soon. The water is as still as a photograph.

I hold the stick high, ready to break its surface, the dog poised to retrieve it.

I regret being the first to unsettle the lake today, but I have promised the dog we'll have our game.

I heave the stick as far as I can, and he leaps after it. Ripples spread from the center toward the shore and from the shore outward,

meeting to debate their momentum.

The dog returns to lay the stick at my feet

and shake himself, his first work of the day done. We repeat this five times,

until he is distracted by a slight movement in the woods.

He tracks some small animal through

underbrush as thick and tangled as the argument she and I had last night. I would stay here, waiting for the lake to become still again,

and myself with it, but the rain has arrived.

The first drop tells the lake a perfect circle, rhyming itself across the water as we

begin the long walk back up the hill.