Chimney Bluffs

Douglas Crase

Here, where you didn't expect it, is the highest point
On the deepest lake, a modest elevation which nonethe-
  less
Provokes a satisfactory surprise: there's no need for
Reviewing more of the shore than this. From your
  current
Position you can see the wide spaces between the waves;
Far from "trooping" toward you, the waves seem to
  come
Distracted, slow, breaking apart in separate accidents
On the narrow beach. You can see why a place like this
Might have been sacred to the Cayugas, and there's
 something
Reassuring about that even though none of us knows for
 sure.
There was a time when you thought the meaning of such
 spots
Was necessary for survival, that it could be peeled off
Like the bark of a paper birch and used to transport us
In swift canoes past the hostile Iroquois. But your efforts

Convinced you at last that what's indigenous is also
By nature recalcitrant: the canoes were a lost art and
The ensuing confrontation failed to smoke out any
  prophecies.
So there you were after the calamity, disappointed to
  find,
Despite your investment of "blood, sweat and tears," that
There was no more meaning returned than was there
  before.
Perhaps you thought it was useless to go on, that the
  most
You could do was stand there marking time, that you
  had
Reached, too early, the interminable final phase. I might
Be nice and say it was all part of your progress here
But of course you could have missed this place just as
You've missed so many others along the way. Yet here
  you are,
And what you make of the occasion will be inevitable,
Knowing you. The edges aren't secure, but they are safe:
The withered clay is hunched in great shoulders against
The wind. Given the cloud cover that prevails, the bluffs
Appear as gray, and only in late afternoon or dawn
When the light comes in horizontally are the startling
Intricacies revealed. On the map it says the place is
"Undeveloped" but this beautiful erosion didn't happen
 Overnight. Life curries its own patterns as it goes,
 Dislodging first a pebble, a hunk of clay, the roots
 Of a smooth dumb beech. You seldom see it happening,
 Which explains why people don't wish on erosion the
  way
 They do on shooting stars; yet it's there, tracing
 Delicate downfalls when your back is turned.
 It's enough to come up on it suddenly like this,
 To recognize its brilliant irregularities
 And be left living-the sufficient remainder.