A Beautiful Contradiction: Post for 11/2

A Beautiful Contradiction

By Kristen Looper

A nature path

Beautiful and relaxing

Unknown creature in rustling bushes

Groups of dragonflies perform their dances

Birds make soprano sounds

Accompanied by the bass voices of toads

Breezes tousle branches

And make cattails sway

Shadows are formed

By trees

By birds overhead

Living secrets below
A lake of broken glass

Reflecting a blue sky

White clouds

Bright yellow sun

A nature path

Can a true one exist?

The flip-flop of shoes

On the concrete path

Airplanes above

The hum of city life

Houses interrupting forests

Trains and cars leave trails behind

And sing a broken tune

All so out of place

A contradiction to nature

I went to Lake Bonny Park for this field trip, and I stayed there for at least 45 minutes. I’m no poet. I know that. I have been worried about this assignment since Professor Corrigan announced it in class, partly because I didn’t really have time to go to Lake Bonny Park and mostly because I am no poet. I don’t know how a poet makes their words flow in that way. They make it seem so easy. My brain just doesn’t work that way. From Mary Oliver’s Walking Home from Oak-Head comes the stanza, “I’ll stand in the doorway stamping my boots and slapping my hands, my shoulders covered with stars”. I can’t even pretend to have the kind of talent that can turn “I came inside and shook off the snow” into beautiful words like that. I guess that is why I can appreciate poetry, even though I sometimes don’t like it. I can’t do it.

Now, about my experience at the park. I didn’t go in the morning or the evening when it was cool. I went in the afternoon, the only time I could go, when it was hot. I went alone, but that was kind of stupid. I walked that whole nature path. It was pretty sometimes, when there were no buildings or drainage ditches or signs saying “Nature Path 1.3 Miles”. That wasn’t much of the time. It helped to look the other way. I guess you could say that this was the way I came up with my poem. It wasn’t really a nature path. It was a path that happened to have nature on it. As I walked I read the poems by Mary Oliver, focusing mostly on Six Recognitions of the Lord and Musical Notation: 1. I like how she takes note about the small and simple things. In Six Recognitions she says, “I lounge on the grass, that’s all. So simple.” Often we forget to appreciate those kinds of things. I live in the middle of a cow pasture, grass all around, and I forget. In Musical Notation she mentions her old dog who appreciated flowers. If a dog can appreciate them, I would imagine we can, too. The difference between us and the dog is that we are so preoccupied with other things. The dog has no cares and no schedule. I had been worried about fitting this trip into my schedule when I should have just realized that I needed to appreciate the small things. The sun on my face, the wind in my hair, and the light dancing off the surface of the lake are all so beautiful, yet so easy to overlook.