January Thaw (haibun)

We’ve had an old-fashioned winter in Ontario, a

welcome and dramatic change from the ongoing effects

of global warming. We had the most snowfall in sixty

years in December. The daily temperature has remained

below freezing for over six weeks, and the snow has 

continued to accumulate.

Chase running

through snow tunnels

twice his height

Yesterday we entered another old-fashioned winter

tradition, the January thaw. The temperature has

climbed well above freezing, an increase of over 30

degrees Celsius within 24 hours. The snow is rapidly

melting and filling the air with water vapour.

On our daily walk to the boat launch, clouds swept

along the Crowe River. Chase and I slipped along the

icy path to stand at our usual spot on the dam:

floating 

among clouds

on the Marmora dam

false spring

but my heart

doesn’t care

      * * *

snow drifts by sumacs

shivering by the outhouse

awaiting summer

by Warren Fraser

(my former neighbour at my ZenRiver retreat in the hamlet of Malone)  

                            ~   ~    ~

This haibun is from my 2008 book ZenRiver: Poems & Haibun, Hidden Brook Press

Today it's another old-fashioned snowy day, with snow banks piled several feet high along my driveway. I just felt like reminiscing. 

*Chase was my shitzu/cocker cross constant companion from 2006 - 2015 

Sorrow Falls to Hillview - a fall haibun

I generally don't feel exuberantly creative in my old age, but I still enjoy daily fall hikes where I live on the edge of the Kawartha Lakes region of Ontario. Following is from my 2008 book, ZenRiver: Poems & Haibun. Hidden Brook Press   

Yesterday I felt it was time to revisit our trails. Sorrow Falls is the shortest drive, and it is one of the prettiest and most encouraging of reminiscing for me. It was on the Sorrow Falls trail and at Callaghan’s Rapids Conservation Area that I experienced my return to Buddhism and spirituality four years ago.

It was an overcast day, but within the first one hundred yards a great blue heron rose and flew parallel with our path - a nice omen. The walk continued uneventfully but enjoyably. I inspected my shaman carving on the top railing of the wooden bridge. I had done this carving during a rest stop on one of Chase and my ten mile winter hikes last year.

As always, the trail’s natural calm transmitted to Chase and me, although on the long walk through the cedar forest Chase decided to go on a solo exploration to sniff among the mossy fallen stumps.

redheaded woodpecker

stirs shaman instincts

while Chase explores

After half an hour we reached Sorrow Falls. Beavers had completely cut off the creek’s flow, and the ledges of the falls were exposed. Even the basin was dry. We clambered to the tiny island above the falls, where I’d previously hung prayer flags, and then began walking upstream on the dry creek bed.

dry leaves

fill the basin below

moss-covered falls

  

This is where I found my fish suiseki several years ago. The fallen leaves hid any potential finds, though, and it wasn’t until we were a few yards from the new beaver dam that I found a gorgeous multi-coloured beauty. I lugged it beside the trail where I stashed it for future removal.

I considered turning back at this point, but we decided to continue along the flat section of trail and then began climbing the long slope. At the crest of the hill, in a small clearing to the west, was a frozen whitetail deer. Chase must not be a natural hunter, for he had dashed ahead, and never saw nor winded the deer. I could see the deer’s body and head and even his eyes. After a few seconds, it bounded off.

your white flag

tells us it’s time

to head home

from review of ZR: p&h in World Haiku Review 

Vol. 7 #1. March 2009 by former Haiku Canada

President Terry Ann Carter

 One of the finest haiku in the collection is this one:

dry leaves 

fill the basin below

moss covered falls

With its allusions to opposites (the dry leaves, the waterfall) the presence of absence, the shape of the dry basin clearly outlined against the growing moss covering fallen stumps which gives its own olfactory resonance, this haiku captures an ordinary moment with extraordinary skill.

fan letters today

Decades ago I realized I'd never earn a living as a Canadian poet. The greatest satisfaction I can receive for being a Canuckian poet is when my work touches someone's life or soul. This morning I received two unexpected such emails. The first is regarding a copy of ZenRiver: Poems & Haibun which I loaned to a new neighbour. The second emails are from the nephew of the two "bushrats" who befriended me when I moved to the eastern Kawartha Lakes area over 31 years ago. 

Chris
Bill and his wife came over this morning - gave them tour and he had really good ideas. Thank you for the contact!
And i want to buy the second book from you to savour. Only read summer section because i wanted to stay in sync with season. 3 lines, one haiku, in there stuck in my head.
Advertised yard sale but may have to postpone as storms are predicted for Sunday but i wont cancel yet... its only Thursday!
Best
B

                                                                       ~    ~    ~

Hello Chris, my name is Patrick Hill. I am a nephew of Joe and Bob Hill, I loved the poem you wrote and have shared it with the rest of our family. I was hoping that you had some more stories and or experiences you could share on these two? By the way, the medals were Joe's, he served in the merchant marine Lol. I have a family Facebook page filled with over 500 newspaper articles on the Hill family and their run ins with the law. Their mother was sent to jail for 3 months and she had to take her 4 month old baby with her, moonshine was her offence.

hope this reaches the right person
Cheers
Patrick Hill


                                                                     .    .    .

Thank you so much for responding. I can hardly wait to see what comes to mind after the beers. Family lore has it that Joe was involved in the 1961 bank robbery, but the info is scarce. I have read the book, and seen the play at our local outdoor theater, 4th line theater.

I was having a visit with two of my cousins and they told me that Joe was involved with a bank robbery in Norwood, but never got caught.
This family has a long history of breaking the law and family feuds, we lost a great uncle in 1905 to a drive by shooting (horse and buggy). Lots of info on assaults, pig stealing, cattle stealing, cattle poisoning, arson, moonshining, murder, attempted murder, etc. 

I would love to share the info with any historian, it is all public information, you just have to know where to find it. Lol.
Cheers and I look forward to our next chat.
You must have also known Hindu (Yeomans) that lived by the bridge at deer river.

Patrick Hill



here's their poem:

a bushrat's intimations of mortality at Callaghan's Rapids

in memory of Joe and Bob Hill


guy at the liquor store
old dude like me
12 pack on the conveyor belt
asks if the snow on my empties
is from ice fishing on Crowe Lake

'nope, just snow drifted into my porch
haven't been on the ice drinking beer
hoping for a pickerel bite in decades'

'Say, you must know some friends of mine?'
I answer with the Hill brothers,
Joe & Bob
old bushrat brothers who taught me
to fish & hunt when I moved here
quarter century ago
both been dead for a decade or more

'Don't know them,' he replied
what about Fred Smith?
yeah, he was a neighbour for a while
beautiful wife
'yeah, she left him for down south'

I say, 'I'd rather have liquor than a wife!'
half joking - maybe not
yeah, Joe & Bob Hill
they had a bunch of other brothers
but it was those two bushrats
who showed this big city kid
the ropes of rural life


Cordova outlaws - yeah
some tall true tales from those two
fought like all brothers
told some nasty stories on each other
maybe true
medals from World War Two
but which one!
or both

hydro crewmen
dynamite, booze
cooking in camps
on the hydro line cuts
which civilized this area
if Al Purdy had held a steady job
he'd a been one of them

Bob & Joe
tried to teach me to fish pickerel
Scott's Dam - bottle of rye
in my back pocket
sipped it to impress them
& dull the black fly bites

flies leave me alone now
they don't like bushrat blood
anyway - 
but flies sure loved my
virgin rye-laced freshness

after the LCBO drop-off
Chase & I wander Callahan's Rapids
the haunted trail - den-laced cedars
tracks everywhere - underground creeks
as well - careful every step
Chase & I take or we could be stranded
broken legs

and I think back on Bob & Joe Hill
can't remember if I promised not to write about them
crazy blood brothers who lived in this
halfway land of muskie rivers, creeks, swamps
Bob bragged he'd fucked on every island
in Cordova Lake
a challenge I've never followed
(well once or twice)

Bob & Joe
dead too young from alcohol
& doctors who don't respect bush people


Bob & Joe's stories reverberate:
the big bank robbery in Havelock
robbers had a boat stashed across Belmont Lake
when the dirt track ended the cops' chase lakeside
they paddled across smooth as silk
money & robbers never found -
some still looking for both


never thought before
but was it them?
my old bushrat buddies
Joe drove a new Lincoln
but his money I bet
came from his slicko gambling
slyer than the Campbellford
doctors & lawyers from campsite poker
he'd suck them in with mispronounced words
lose a few hands to the city suckers
then bang down big when the pot grew large

or ...........
all this aft's walk I thought of Bob & Joe
long, long gone to that big swamp in the sky
bushrat brothers, Bob measured his winters
by muskies lying on the snow of Blairton Bay

guess I'm the next generation now
not half as tough, but still upright
growing craggy & beer bellied
still walking the trails they showed me
the secret fishing holes
the icy islands where they lived & loved


Chris Faiers

January 20, 2014

Curating my poetry and life

At the end of June I turned 69. This means not only have I fully entered old fartdom, but statistically I'm close to the last decade of my life. Most poets don't seem to live long and happy lives - the best usually burn out early. Two of my literary heroes, Basho and Kerouac, didn't make it to 50. I feel I'm in a poetic "bonus round" to have lived so long, and now it's time for curating and archiving whatever poetic legacy I may be leaving for posterity. 

The 8 years of organizing Purdyfests were over 3 summers ago, and I sold my ZenRiver Gardens retreat at the end of the following summer. The Muse's ecstatic visits have also become rarer, and  now I'm rummaging thru the shelves, boxes. files and trunks of my Marmora bungalow looking for new homes for the thousands of poetry books, chapbooks, broadsheets, letters, flyers and ephemera. 

It's so hard parting with much of this material. For the past several years a winter project has been sending a packet or two to the American Haiku Archives at the California State Library. Again this year I'm preparing material for them, a bit more ruthlessly than in years past, as I want to ensure that some of this literarily valuable material is properly preserved.

The process of sending orphan material to a new home is far more difficult than imagined, tho. These legacies of the hundreds of poets I've known, befriended, published, and shared readings with keep demanding a further reading, a final gentle brushing of the covers and some deep reminiscing.         

In particular I've been revisiting the work of my haiku mentor, Dr. Eric Amann, and my Toronto friend, Shaunt Basmajian. When I Googled images of Shaunt, not a true pic could be found. Oddly, I did find the following article on my 2008 book. So while I continue to dither in my cold front porch, piles of books falling around me, I modestly decided to put this posting from the Marmora Historical Society site on riffs & ripps.