Claudia Buckholts
Lake Winnipesaukee
I sat on the porch of the grey cabin
dangling my feet over the water.
The lake’s small waves lapped gently
against the shore. Vines bearing night-
blooming flowers sweetened the air.
Days, the six of us tracked sand
over bare floors and no one cared.
We ate and slept when we wanted.
Damp bathing suits dried on the porch,
mine still clammy when I put it on.
One night we dived into the lake
and swam naked under a bright moon
that swung through the trees, a ripe
orange. Waterweed draped us like
green hair; the others swam laughing
around me; happiness suffused my body,
a drug too rare, too sweet, to keep.
I remember those who were with me then,
who shared in the radiant morning,
the calm of evening. Water laps on
that shore still; ducks build rough nests
in reeds. Now I swim out past the center
of the lake, farther than I’ve ever gone,
no longer trusting the weight of water
to carry me. My arms grow weary,
and I lose sight of the shore.
No one calls me to come back.
Claudia Buckholts' third collection of poems is Travelers on Earth (Main Street Rag, 2023). She received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and Massachusetts Artists Foundation, and the Grolier Prize. Her poems have appeared in Minnesota Review, New American Writing, Prairie Schooner, The Southern Review, Verse Daily, and elsewhere.