#NewThisDay Writing From My Photo Stream
Yes, I walked, but also swam again in the pond, late afternoon. The woods have reached that July stage of horseflies that swarm and chase and won't be stopped no matter how much I slap. Charlie and Suzi don't mind. But my greatest pleasure again today is a long swim – and then, the discovery of this poem by Maxine Kumin to describe the experience of being in the lake, immersed, so exquisitely. And, even though her poem is about a morning swim, and I didn't set off for mine until the late afternoon, after the sun beat heat into it all day, she captures the feeling of rhythm and oneness with the body of water. And I had already decided to aim for a morning swim tomorrow, in honor of the 4th of July:
“. . . I set out, oily and nude
through mist, in chilly solitude.
There was no line, no roof or floor
to tell the water from the air.
Night fog thick as terry cloth
closed me in its fuzzy growth.
I hung my bathrobe on two pegs.
I took the lake between my legs.
Invaded and invader, I
went overhand on that flat sky.
Fish twitched beneath me, quick and tame.
In their green zone they sang my name
and in the rhythm of the swim
I hummed a two-four-time slow hymn.
I hummed “Abide With Me.” The beat
rose in the fine thrash of my feet,
rose in the bubbles I put out
slantwise, trailing through my mouth.
My bones drank water; water fell
through all my doors. I was the well. . . .”
