stumps grow from the lake
and the wind blows your kayaks
into them, you pass over shallow
sunken logs, narrowly avoid
the rocks and finally lift your heads to a
ornate brick chimney, stories tall.
a sawmill, you've heard
as you approaching hear people talking
wave awkwardly, clamber onto a dam
pull kayaks up after
a giant's split flywheel,
an empty cylinder case,
a water turbine, rusted
whose inlet in the low summer
you can just crawl down
without getting bare feet
in sulphured flow
talk to those heard earlier
and this was a furniture mill
running on steam
or on water
from 1830 to 1967
three stories of lathes and saws
her uncle did the beautiful
flourishing chimney
he worked in buffalo
making silicon carbide
and voted, first, for Eisenhower
now rues November's options
but manufacturing moved, this
water-powered marvel wasn't
worth repairing when it burnt down
and fifty years later all
metal flaked shafts stolen it
pins together different stories
of steam technology
industrial economy
lived experience.
paddle back, downwind now,
between the stumps water rose over
when its weight no longer
turned chair legs