Epic Walk Diaries (September 2)

fruity prequel
   apples pears and guests

[ there is nothing like an apple right off the tree ]

    brambly webs of striped predators
 to fenced greens and rocky shores
    later for this final reckoning of riches

quel 
   to the wrong riches
  not quel
 schloss is our gain
   a veiled secret to an entrance
     [why us?]
  glad to escape the colonial 
      mud says more

monoculture park
   an invitation to trespass
 ganesh welcomes this begin
     [ remover of obstacles! ]
   sacred care
      ruby before stones

low tide
   [ can a river have low tide? ]
 grasses muddy to a martha stewart hue
    show the waves of time
      hide chasms of mud
      [ only the feet know ]
   
  a hinted salamander
   small like a mouse
     scurries like a squirrel

sprinkles of violet [asters]
   yellow 
     white (joined by pink juniors this time)
  magenta strands of invasion
    the old browns standing tall
       rosehips (the colonial kind)
   hawthorn reds
       deadly ones too

you take the low road
     [ the logs captured enslaved corpses ]
   i take the high road
        [ hugging brambles ]
  feasting on unseen blackberries
           watching the shore one
     on muddy ganesh-approved tracks

merging for the stony feast
      brambles finally give
    we have earned this resolve
[ how many before we pay later? ]

rock steps of uncertain balance
   a dance with slippery partners
     [ how would the japanese do this? ]
  grace to the finish

surer returning steps
    a fall bouquet forming
      [ you look timeless
               with this wild beauty in your hands]

-----
[
  Start 1:30
  End 4:00
  False start at McCleery Golf Course,
  to the schloss at the Marine Drive Golf Club,
  given permission for early morning with a hint
  to an easier way, to the Fraser River Park full
  of hawthorns, past a NO TRESPASSING sign,
  past a Hindu shrine on the river shore,
  scramble through flattened grasses, logs, rocks,
  mud, wild flowers, brambles, to the edge of McCleery,
  and back, past the shrine now joined by sunbather,
  blocked by a sunstroked seashore-cleaning kayaker,
  and to Lola (and water).
]