Poetical Poetry: Solitude in a Canoe

Today is Thanksgiving,
And thanks we will give
Gathered for the feasting
And the boasting
And the boasting of feasting
That is almost better than the meal itself.
This is the network from which all things proceed.

The leaves have their network, too--
High above the water, grouped by surname:
Post Oak, Ironwood, Cedar.
We gather together;
Leaves drift apart, falling bit by bit
Into the water,
Tiny unlit funeral pyres
The archer couldn’t reach.

Trees are indifferent to grief.
Grief is indifferent to thanks,
Yet rests upon it,
The nutritive source of all its numerous stages.
Today we give thanks for all that we have.
Today we give thanks for what we have lost,
for what we’re still losing:
the incendiary, the raw, and the old.

We give thanks for the gifts of the new.