STATE LINES
California Poetry
Yosemite is a California gem and one of the country’s natural treasures. Only a special artist can evoke its beauty. Oakland poet Austin Smith follows the footsteps of John Muir and Ansel Adams by carrying us on a hike to (and then beyond) one of the park’s signature features, Mirror Lake. A nature poem typically expresses a poet’s wonder, which extends to the reader. This set of relationships feels communal and arcs toward spiritual deliverance. “Beyond Mirror Lake” doesn’t settle for that convention. Instead, Smith swerves his poem toward more personal and ghostly ground. The trembling tree summons forth a “wordless, private fear” in the speaker, an existential terror rather than the expected transcendental wonder.
Beyond Mirror Lake
Left the city before the first sirens. Crossed the bridge, crossed the valley, Its blossoming orchards and dormant crosses. Let the car carry me against the streams Running the other way, as if they knew something I didn’t. Reached Yosemite. Paid my fee. Left keys, Wallet, phone, everything identifying me behind And started up the path to Mirror Lake. Passed tourists taking selfies, backpackers consulting maps. Beyond the lake: no one. The trail narrowing, the light Floating up the sheer cliffs, leaving the valley In shadow. A branch held a blue flannel shirt Out for me. It gave me a chill, being offered clothes Clear out there, but it was nothing compared To the chill a dead oak gave me like a ring Last worn by the dead. I stopped As if ordered to, having never seen a tree Tremble like that tree was trembling, the tambourines Of its dry leaves rattling in a breeze that didn’t stir Those of any other tree. The thing that spooked me About the leaves was how perfect they were even though They were dead, like the willow motif carved Into the headboard of my childhood bed. It was as if they were trying to pass for living leaves And in so doing betrayed the tree, like stars Sewn onto clothing. The tree seemed to be shivering And I felt I had come to the place where The earth fears for herself. This fear was nothing Like our fear of terror or the warming of the planet But a wordless, private fear we were never Meant to know. And I felt like a boy who, Hearing a strange sound upstairs, climbs The steps and sees, through the keyhole, His father weeping, and knows that What has always been so Certain will never be certain again. “Beyond Mirror Lake” appears with the permission of the author. All rights reserved. Austin Smith is the author of the poetry collection “Almanac,” published through the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets in 2013. His second collection, “Flyover Country,” is forthcoming from Princeton in September.