“Late Spring” by Fredrick Pollack

         "Late Spring"

I had recently moved to the area.
We met at a party.
A few weeks later, we rode
at dawn along the paths of a park 
completed, she told me, a few years before.
The forest was still young and out of bounds,
but the lake was very popular. We parked
our bikes by a tree, laid a blanket,
swam and made love.
On the opposite shore another couple,
barely visible, were doing likewise;
they waved.

                         We were still finding out about
each other. As we picnicked we spoke
about what we had tried, what accomplished,
what might turn into an accomplishment.
She refused to choose between art
and archaeology. (I had seen
some of her work; it was good.)
Beyond the hill behind the lake
lay a meadow, she said, of which she had done
some drawings. When we got there
I marveled at the intensity of green.
It’s a mass grave, she said,
one of the small ones; we’re not sure
who they were. There’s a marker up at the trailhead.

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