today’s poem is set presumably at durward’s glen in caledonia township, columbia cty, wisconsin. from his 1882 self-printed book, poems: vol 1.
a macabre ending, and i assume “cicala” is supposed to be “cicada.” summer in the glen.
i grew up visiting durward’s glen outside baraboo, wisconsin. it was/is a stupendous place: a secluded sandstone and conglomerate gorge flanking prentice creek on a small wooded lot outside the precambrian baraboo hills.
later on in life, when i moved to milwaukee, i found out that the glen was named after bernard durward, a scottish immigrant to milwaukee in the 1840s and a transplant to the baraboo area in the 1860s. i also found out that i currently live on the same street he lived on way back then.
all this (and that he became the first professor of english at the catholic seminary here near milwaukee and was an artist and poet) led me to start getting together a new edition of his poems, which i’m hoping to publish within the next couple years.
but in the meantime, i’m just itching to get his work out there sooner than that, so: i’ve recently come into a copy of durward’s poems from 1882. i’m going to start posting here regularly an audio file of one milwaukeean (me) reading another milwaukeean’s (durward) poems. we’ll see if i can make it happen daily, but every few days anyway.
two further bits: 1) the illustrations will be images from bernard’s son’s book wildflowers of the glen (1875), used by permission of the milwaukee public library, which holds the volume now, and 2) this is 19th-century american verse, so sometimes there will be some settler-colonial sentiments present—this is a sad but real aspect of midwestern history. i won’t post poems that are particularly problematic if i come across any. but to be clear: the durwards and my own ancestors and lots of yankees and european immigrants directly benefited from the land-grabs of the american federal and wisconsin state governments, and this was a terrible terrible series of events for the indigenous peoples of “the old northwest” and for the colonizers and the descendants of all of the too. as junot díaz says, “we’ve all been in the sh*t ever since.”
history being what it is, i still think generally that folks’ art is worth engaging and wrestling with even in their limitations, as we all have our limitations as well.
with that, poem #1, “the dells“:
kratzsch preserve is a 72-acre wood and wetland lot of former farmland rehabilitated by the ozaukee and washington county land trust. they’re doing good work here people. prairie, marsh, hardwood forest, frontage on the milwaukee river, glacial topography; little bit of everything.
this was a great hike, up and down, good steady wind on the prairie but some shelter in the woods and down by the river. snow drifts gave us a workout. sat with the robins and redwing blackbirds by the river for a spell. four lunes and views for you.
a.
snowmarsh and cattails
crows cawing—
trunk shadow and gone
b.
cork margin’s lake-edge
on dead birch
perilous gambit
c.
prairie grass hoophouse
seedhead sprays
accent the esker
d.
confluence upstream
milwaukee
runs on in light snow
pavcek preserve is a small hardwood forest in the kettle moraine near holy hill. a small esker in the upland area, kettles and manmade ponds in the lowlands. we were expecting a springish walk w/ just-emerging spring ephemerals to check out, but then snow happened over the weekend, so back to the snowcovered woods and ice. beautiful and bracing.
a tufted titmouse gave us quite a concert near the largest pond, flitting in and out of trees and a large hollow branch of an oak.
a.
the winter kettle
under pines
hummingbird away
b.
tufted titmouse hoots
in and out
of oaken branchhome
c.
sunlight on pond ice
cardinals, crows,
snow below cherries
scuppernong springs is a natural area in the south unit of the kettle moraine state forest, a rehabilitated wetland area (mostly marsh) along scuppernong creek-then-river. it was once the site of marl pits and works, a hotel, a trout hatchery, and cranberry bogs, but the wdnr and others have been doing lots of work.
a lovely site to walk thru, the boundary between land and water pretty shaky at times. kids loved it; playing in the stream in the 40s and cloudy with the waterproof boots. my 6yo fell in finally as a soft spring rain began to fall as well; he was fine. 🙂
‘scuppernong’ is reportedly from a ho-chunk word that means ‘sweet-smelling place.’
a.
cool air and crane song
spring water
cuts gravel and sand
b.
below the cattails
slate-blue sand
feeding the river
c.
before the spring-mouth
spring rain starts
scuppernong drifts by
brady’s rocks is a dolostone outcropping of the niagra escarpment in waukesha cty’s southern unit kettle moraine state forest. the ice age trail cuts right thru this delightful small maze where an irish immigrant (the eponymous brady) once quarried stone in the mid-19th century. some rare plants and massive oaks.
it had been too long since we’d been out, and the kids called it for this site, as our last visit here had been heavily mosquito-infested a few summers ago. (to the point that we all literally ran thru the site and back out.) much nicer now in the march chill!
first id of walking fern, slender rockcress, and white avens!
a.
liverwort and cranes
returning
the mammals rejoice
b.
ring round dolostone
the oak arms
reform the gray sky
c.
on your limy perch
the tapered
leaves radiating
this notice is coming a little late, as i’ve been stepping back from online presence somewhat. but here goes:
on my last trip to california in july ’22, i was reading kerouac again. on the extra day we gained from a cancelled flight, we were in a little cafe near haight-ashbury, and a pome made its way onto paper. kerouac’s influence is strong, as was the macchiato.
the crank mag has graciously published it in their latest issue, available here. tho note that the cover has explicit (male) nudity, in case you’re sensitive to such material.
pax inter spinas
columbus ave. beetle
high cliff escarpment state natural area is inside high cliff state park in calumet cty, wisconsin on the eastern shore of lake winnebago. here is a fantastic length of exposure of the niagra escarpment, the dolostone rock formation that arcs from southeastern wisconsin to niagra falls.
a hardwood forest atop the escarpment contains a number of effigy mounds, mostly water panthers and a set of twin buffaloes. the combination of the gloaming, shagbark hickories, mounds, and limestone was exquisite. three lunes here to celebrate.
three generations of riyeffs up and down the cliffs. last sna in calumet cty!
a.
lake winnebago
quietly
all the frozen waves
b.
spreading tobacco
on the mounds
no bird call, no stars
c.
the ledge tumbling
so slowly
thousands of sunsets
the christmas vacation almost over, i made a brash decision to head up to calumet county for two sna’s, converging on lake winnebago with three generations of family.
stockbridge ledge woods was the first stop, a mature forest atop the niagra escarpment, according to the wdnr website. lots of sugar maple, beech, and oak. though it’s january, it was in the upper 30s so felt like a thaw. some snow still clinging, but lots of places bare too. lots of moss and lichen, but also some liverwort coming up (or hanging on?), and some grasses still green. woodpeckers briefly the only sounds aside from upright primates.
the niagra escarpment, made of ordovician-silurian dolomite, is the edge of an ancient sea with exposures from new york thru southeastern wisconsin. the exposures in this part of wisconsin are known collectively as “the ledge.”
a.
the westering sun
shadows snow
new beech making home
b.
wood ears in oak leaves
surviving
january thaw
c.
early liverwort
or last year’s?
woodpeckers all ’round
if you’ve made it this far, diminutive mushrooms:
point beach ridges is, according to the wdnr website, a series of 11 swales and ridges parallel to the current lake michigan shoreline in manitowoc cty. the ridges and swales are former beaches of the last eight millennia that used to border glacial lake nipissing. open blowing sand near the lake to juniper/bearberry dunes to swampy swales to fully forested ridges give this site a tremendously varying quality. super fun to hike, and we had a gorgeous late-autumn day for it.
last visit to walk all of manitowoc cty’s snas.
first id’s of bearberry, bunchberry, birch polypore, and dune goldenrod! first non-bog id of sphagnum moss. (thanks to twitter folks for help with recent ids)
a.
beech leaves under ice
sunlight in
thru cedar swamp boughs
b.
newest beach’s dunes
juniper
comes to view from sand
c.
waves under midday sun
galloping
to the chilled shingle
d.
these tiny dune-lasts
circling
the sea’s own leavings
e.
clouds in western sky
stranded strips
of yellow birch bark
f.
o kinnickkinnick
bearberry
bless and grace this beach!
Jacob Riyeff 