Mother We Won't Forsake You
Bottle-necked At Great Mother Bay
oil on canvas
27 x 54"
2021
Inspired by Dr. Michael Salcman's poem, Mother of the Bay I painted his words:
"the snowmelt drains from far in the throats
of Adirondack creeks, adding fresh water to the mix
of ocean brack and grasses making up the Chesapeake:
a Susquehannock word for great river
where strange fish with hard coverings lay—unknowing
in giving a name to our Bay, praying for its survival.
1. First published in Connecticut River Review, 2006
first collected in Salcman's The Enemy of Good is Better, Orchises Press, Washington D.C., 2011
Reprinted & revised as above in Salcman's_Necessary Speech: New & Selected Poems_, Spuyten Duyvil, New York, 2022