14 August 2022
By Philip Kuepper
I live on the Left Bank
of the Mystic,
and cross the river,
three days a week,
to the Right Bank, where I work
at the library, atop a hill,
below which, lining our one boulevard,
are bakeries, breweries, restaurants, shops,
a street that has become a boutique,
to which people come
from hundreds of miles round,
from round the world, actually,
to vacation for a weekend,
or for the season, Mystic, to them,
a dream become a reality
become a memory. The river
flows to a bay, a river appliqued
with rowers, kayakers, catboats, skiffs,
and a schooner that sets sail, daily,
allowing the landbound the thrill
of being out on the water,
of seeing where they have just been,
from a different angle,
inviting a fresh perspective.
Sailing is the stuff that takes on the shape
of beauty, the hands of experience
can sculpt at will, while the same sun
that hangs over the Seine, evenings,
hangs over the Mystic, evenings,
sculpted romantic by thoughts, ineffable,
thus all the more deeply felt,
made richer by the realization
such thoughts are fleeting,
beginning to pass the moment they are thought,
thoughts that sculpt
Left and Right Banks into a whole,
the silken river acting as a medium
to hold together the thought
of what, of who was loved.
(2 July 2022)