I’ve come back to the lake
to find something I know
how to feel but not voice.
I breathe deeply some lake scent
I sometimes catch
in East Tennessee. I take off
my clothes, and the lake
admits me. I rub the bank’s
mud into my beard.
I scratch my back against
the reeds. I pace along
the grass, trying to find
the right picture. I don’t know
how to make the lake
become me. I don’t know
how to become
the memory inside.
after Robert Wrigley
- What do we expect to experience in a place? And how does that contrast with our actual experience there? There are dozens of lakes near my home in Nashville, yet I'm constantly thinking of this one in New York. If I got there, wouldn't I just be getting wet, same as here? What would make my being there more authentic? What would make my experience live up to the expectation?