In the Poetic Forest

The Bashō Trees of Acadia




Northern forests in the east
are littered with brief poems
written in white bark code
on curled scrolls peeled
from paper birches.
Each is a secret haiku
scripted in dashes to read
like Braille with your fingertips.
I retrieve one scrap hidden
in the duff by Jordan Pond,
ponder its lines embossed
on papyrus, deciphering:

Mist lifts. Loon surfaces.
Bold tremolos echo through
cold light of wildness.

***

While the above poem was written in Maine's Acadia National Park, I remain in Acadia -- up in the Canadian portion of that land once widely settled by the French who were later ousted from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia when the British took control. Many of the deported French ended up in Louisiana and became known as Cajuns and were immortalized in Longfellow's poem "Evangeline."

Acadia is a land of birches, firs and granite...a magical land. And today, a special treat: the ferry across the Bay of Fundy from New Brunswick to Nova Scotia. Fundy! Site of the world's greatest tides -- a shift from low to high (or high to low!) up to 48 feet. Such a tremendous tide that you can stand at water's edge and watch the water rise to your feet or ebb away minute by minute. But today, a different view: from atop the bay's great waters on the ferry boat Princess of Acadia.