This Year
Do not be afraid—I will save you.
I have called you by name—you are mine.
—Isaiah 43:1
Today I wake dreaming
of sparrows. I’d dreamed them
through the redbud and black
walnut out by Second Bridge,
and they’d each shared
their singular songs: chipping,
swamp, white-crowned,
American tree. I lie here
in bed awhile with Memory
and listen, then we walk
back to a June afternoon below
Two-Stair Crossing to watch
a bird with a brown-streaked
belly hop from rock to rock
bobbing its tail and snatching
gnats. Louisiana waterthrush.
Yes, I reach out to Memory
to relive that chance encounter—
one bird, one man, and less than
five grand minutes connected
by the creek. We walk a little
farther downstream where
a rush of July and August
friends fly in to greet us: ducks,
herons, woodpeckers, wood-
warblers, mimics, and jays.
Sitting up, but not
quite out of bed, I’m ready
to pull on my Mucks,
put on my mask, pick up
my walking stick and head
for the creek hopeful
that, with distance and luck,
I’ll keep hearing the name
Chuck this year.
[note: An earlier version of this poem first appeared in Pine Mountain Sand & Gravel, Vol 25 (2022), journal of the Southern Appalachian Writers Cooperative.]
This poem is from the chapbook By Fowlers Fork by Chuck Stringer (Finishing Line Press), and is available at https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/by-fowlers-fork-by-chuck-stringer/
By Fowlers Fork, Chuck Stringer’s first poetry collection, chronicles his daily walks by a suburban creek near his home in Northern Kentucky. Beginning in the early days of the pandemic, these poems document one man’s efforts to enter, experience, and name the abundance of flora and fauna, habitat and history found in and along the creek’s flowing. From its Ordovician fossil past, through its Fort Ancient artifacts and presences, to the spray paint graffiti of some local teens, By Fowlers Fork employs a variety of poetic forms as it takes the reader on an intimate journey into one creek’s sacred space and time, and its unexpected wildness.
Chuck Stringer lives with his wife Susan by Fowlers Fork, a creek in the Gunpowder Watershed located in Boone County, Kentucky. He is a member of the Southern Appalachian Writers Cooperative. His poems have been published in Anthropocene: Poems About Environment, For a Better World, Literary Accents, Pine Mountain Sand & Gravel, Riparian, and other journals.
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