ISLAND

When we are too old to ride our bikes 

or each other we will ride the ferry 

here to this island every fall when the chill 

fills the air.  We will sit in adirondack chairs 

and look out on the bay's white waves, the deep blue 

churning, grey clouds rolling over us,  

silver birch like old bones behind us, dark 

cedars brooding.  We will no longer speak.  

Our children will not know what to call us.  

We will live in our memories -- you 

a little girl sleeping in your grandmother's bed, 

elm leaves washing in the Louisville wind, 

the sun dancing across your eyes.  I will 

dream of things I never really knew and

the jabber of Michigan crows crying 

like a baby we left somewhere behind.  

We will see the copper sunset 

in each other's eyes, smell 

the wheat in each other's hair.  

Bury us like an old rowboat 

rotting on the roadside.  

Cover us with dirt, and 

in the springtime plant a myth.  

It will grow.