Poems by Robert Claps

River Returning

by Robert Claps

From Canary Spring 2021

Robert lives in his native Connecticut, close to the mouth of the Connecticut River where it empties into Long Island Sound. Each spring he fishes for shad, whose numbers have been slowly increasing after centuries of devastation. During the Revolutionary war Connecticut river shad was salted and packed in barrels and sent downstream to sustain Washington's troops at Valley Forge.

Every evening now, a great blue gliding
down through the oaks just leafing out
stands motionless on these banks, where
growing up we threaded our way among
bald tires, dead carp, leaking barrels
of solvents the mills our fathers worked at
dumped when no one was looking.
Wasn't the river ours to burn?
Three shifts a day with all the overtime
you wanted turned the water green
but even Uniroyal couldn't kill it
and the river is growing young again:
spawning shad find the ancient ruined
channels and run upstream in numbers
no one living remembers. Yet the oysters
of Long Island Sound work overtime
to filter out the particles of this century's
plastic waste. How tenuous it all is.
Watch the infant oak leaves tremble
as you move quietly, hoping to get closer
before the wings creak open
and without moving the great blue is gone.