The Name of the River

25 LEWIS STEVEN LEWIS THE NAME OF THE RIVER for Clover 1. Late Spring, 1977 And then back in the Hillestad's field the hay is as high as the headlights in my Chevy pickup. Driving through, the worn tires rolling down the dry grasses, sounds as if the field was soaked through, water standing all over Springtown as it does every spring and fall; the mud splashing the wheel housings is the hay brushing the grill and the doors as I pass along the northern fence line (cattle fencing, $79 for 350 ft. at Agway) where the Johnson's corn is now almost waist high. By July, Phil Johnson, his wife and sons, will have taken the field, the hay cut, baled and tied, landing without a splash on the big rickety wagons 2 months behind this truck bumping slowly ahead over the dry earth, riding the clutch to slow it down, as I will again this fall through the floods along Springtown Road, water up over the bumper/I will open the door, water rushing past what would be the running board if the truck was 30 years older, and leaning out to watch the big wake 26 THE MINNESOTA REVIEW fan out over the sites of Muzzi's ponds behind me now, the water flowing back across the road, sinking back into the fields, and into the muddy Wallkill, flowing north, like the Nile, into the Hudson, and then south 120 miles into the hayfields of the Atlantic. 2. June 2, 1977 Late afternoon, the big kitchen seemed crowded with everyone's smiling patience. I walked with my children, Cael out front, and Nancy and Addie on my side, to the back field where we picked wildflowers for the room. By early evening there was the relief of the chores, Steven and I made the bed, gathering and laying out the necessities for later on; my friend Kathy fed the kids, bathed the girls, Steven tended to the goats and the rabbits, and I walked out the screen door, through the gate and onto Coffey Lane the big lilac at the corner of the barn returned to bloom and encircled me like a garland drifting through my long brown hair down my back and over my heavy breasts the green rise of the mountain behind our home was more lovely than it has ever been round and fluid cool streams running toward me and the poppies the queen anne's lace along springtown road where i would flow as in air or water around the pines and the laurel rolling toward my path on the quiet road here i knew everything all things my cheeks blushing with the fading sunlight and the knowledge that everyone and everything knew me floating up and over each deep wave inside my belly 3. The Christening Dress is delicate and white, much longer than your length as if there were much more to you 27 LEWIS than can be held in one forearm. The tiny hat is of intricate lace covering the fine hair and vulnerable pulse; This is the Christening dress of Patricia Henderson, Nancy Henderson, Anne Burton, Adelyn Lewis. It is theirs. Now it is yours, as this house that no one owns, like a field or a river, is yours, born upstairs, here in the middle of all the reminders and smells, the renovations of families still calling it their own. 4. A Short Incomplete History Here are some of the names: they will come back to you when your days are longer, The Hillestads Uve down the end of the land, across a single set of tracks, at the far end of a big hayfield. The Siercks live in the green house behind our barn. The Shulties, who did the brickwork, live in town, and the Lorenzens live on Huguenot Street in the old village. Before that, there are only records, it gets foggy Uke the flats along the river and Springtown Road during Spring and Fall. Perhaps the rest has no meaning here, except to fill the lost spaces which are yours alone; it was Si Lorenzen's baby brother who was last born in your...