Issue 10
Spring 2002
Barbara Spring
From her house on Lake Michigan, Barbara Spring observes changes in the Great Lakes. She has traveled to the five Great Lakes and studied their ecology.
She has consulted experts and worked on committees for their improvement. As a teacher and journalist, she has taught classes and published articles about environmental matters.
Her new book, The Dynamic Great Lakes, is about the changing nature of these lakes, their shorelines, their depths and their ecosystems. For more information to www.authorsden.com/barbarajspring or www.geocities.com/barbaraspring/Index
Great Lakes Gifts and Treasures
These lakes hold gifts and treasures —
shining fish of rose gold and silver
bespangled and glittering emerald shiners.
These freshwater seas slide toward the Atlantic
and flow forever in sea dreams.Eagles and swift peregrines ride airstreams
Over beaches of quartz sand and
beaches where agates tumble and slide.Limestone layers rise above
glittering embayments.
Burbot and whitefish dart in depths among
bones of sailors who went down with their ships.Moody and fickle
they chuckle and lap
turn sullen and black they take back
and give and then take back.
Take back.
Soundings
Underneath my feet
tangled tree roots feel their way
through clay and a hodge podge of stones
dropped by the glacier that made Puget Sound.The roots know I am here-
they send the message of me through networks
travel all the way down to the sound
tell the green kelp.Kelp forests tell the seals
I admire them and wish to see them soon.
Out in the sound an octopus in her cave
knows I would join her if I could.And the gray whale I greeted in the Baja last winter
also knows I am here and breaches-
blends its gray with water and sky
so we are all joined in joy.