The following poem is from Paul Hudon’s big poem-a-day book written in 2005-2006, “All in Good Time” (Loom Press, 2011). At various times, Paul has been a professor of history at Merrimack College, curator of pre-industrial artifacts at the Merrimack Valley Textile Museum (now the American Textile History Museum in Lowell), and a young guy growing up in Pawtucketville many years ago. These days he contemplates the meaning of time and the river from the heights above Pawtucket Falls.—PM

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23 October

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the one was courting my sister back when

we lived on Melvin the far end of Little Canada

nice kid and not a mean bone in his body which

let me tell you was an attractive little arrangement

of muscle and need propelled around our kitchen

limbic byways gone juicy with hormonal download

not that we could see that of course when it was

him in our face all the time jokey always on his toes

dancing around Alice like Alice was the only thing

on the planet going his direction leaving him no piece

of mind Alice devoid and irrevocably ignorant

of the wall the bounce and the other side where

unconscionable as gravity the Merrimack takes aim at

the Atlantic like the meaning of life is counting on it

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—Paul Hudon (c) 2011, from “All in Good Time”