A lake,
I was told in school,
Is a smaller body of water;
you can't see the other side
of an ocean.
I stood behind the rocks
willing my sight to the other side
And felt smugly gratified
that it wouldn't reach.
We'll show them,
I told the quiet tide.
We'll show all of them who think
We're so damned little.

Its mood was always changing.
As a teenager,
my bony knees knocking
against the rocks
I loved that.
One day green,
the next day gray, the next
impossibly blue.
Change, change, change
the water rumbled.

Original name:
Lake Chippewa
I read somewhere in college
And for a time
this made me very sad.
Eyes closed, I'd listen
to the crashing waves
and hear the rhythmic chant
of an old Amerindian woman,
someone I never knew
but surely should have
lamenting in an unfamiliar key
the loss of families,
friends and nations,
branches cut to tame
unruly family trees.