River Reminiscing
Catching the early Amtrak train in Rensselaer,
Bound for a day in Manhattan, I grab a window seat
Facing west, the better to see the Hudson. The journey
Hurtles me into a helter-skelter time warp.
In 2002 I watched them cut the ribbon
When they christened the new Rensselaer station, just north
Of the building where as a Kelly temp at the Office of Children
And Family Services, I vetted visitors to the Commissioner’s inner sanctum.
With nothing to do but look friendly and respectable, on an IBM Selectric,
I typed the opening chapters of my novel Eldercide.
Two decades later, the train creeps past OCFS,
Picks up speed through the grungy railyard.
The river magically appears beyond the swampy marshlands, shrouded in mist.
The panorama widens, conjuring vistas immortalized
By painters of the Hudson River School.
Birds skim the shoreline, tugboats push barges, sailboats catch breezes.
At Saugerties, I pushed my granddaughter in her stroller
Along the narrow causeway to the quaint white lighthouse. Now
She’s a dancer in Manhattan, opened for the Rockettes at Radio City.
The Hudson-Rhinecliff bridge calls to mind
An old man on a geriatric ward at Hudson River Psychiatric Center.
He poured cement for the massive foundations, bragged about it when I drove over
The bridge on day trips with patients in a battered Dodge Ram van.
In 2008, on the shore near Kingston, we held
A memorial service for my son-in-law, who died
Too young. As his daughters let loose balloons and scattered ashes
In the Hudson, a Great Blue Heron skimmed low above the water,
South toward the city he had loved.
In Dutchess County we pass the community college nature center
where I gave workshops on dreams and goddesses,
Then a restaurant with an outdoor deck, where Hudson River staff
Snuck lengthy wine-soaked lunches. Long since closed,
The place has fallen into ruin.
North of Poughkeepsie stands a decrepit wooden building.
The boathouse, it was called, back when the Psychiatric Center owned the land.
In the 80’s there were staff parties and patient picnics. Hamburgers, hotdogs,
Softball games in the parking lot. I sucked at sports, screamed when a ball came close,
Cheerfully let the patients laugh at me.
I spent twelve years among the crazies, felt at home,
Years before I freaked and learned I was bipolar.
The State shut down the hospital, like other so-called snake pits,
Turned the patients loose to homelessness and prison.
Past Newburgh, the Hudson widens and the cliffs
Grow steeper. Storm King Mountain,
Then the West Point citadel jutting above the rocks.
During the American Revolution, they stretched
A massive iron chain across the Hudson
To keep the British out. Two centuries later,
My husband, an Army veteran, handled West Point’s public relations.
In 1979. when we abandoned Manhattan, my muses went AWOL
For a while. Still, the river conjures memories – the basalt cliffs of the Palisades
Where my future husband drove his white Nash Rambler
On our first trip out of the city, the George Washington bridge,
Then the red brick apartment where I lived after I got my MFA.
If I opened the window wide and craned my neck,
I could glimpse a sliver of the river.
As the Amtrak Empire train pierces the filthy underbelly of the city,
The Hudson disappears. The tunnel’s darkness deepens. Graffiti
Line the sooty walls. Inside the coach, lights blaze on as travelers shut their laptops
And scurry to disembark. A day of exhausting leisure looms ahead—
A museum, a matinee, dinner with my daughter, miles of walking
I’m in no condition for.
Crowds surge past as I trudge west and climb stairs to the High Line,
The park atop the tracks that used to carry cattle to the slaughter.
Now the meat packing district is home to skyscrapers for billionaires.
(With his company in free fall, one took a swan dive eighteen stories
To the street last week.)
I could never afford to live here anymore. Anyway, at 80,
I’m too creaky and decrepit. What possessed me to take this trip?
To quote the Rolling Stones, this could be the last time, I don’t know.
But standing on the weathered wooden planks of the High Line,
Peering past the native trees and plants, I see the sparkling tidal waters of the Hudson,
The fiery sunset over New Jersey, and I know the river will beckon me back
On yet another adventure.