Hayden Brooks
Artist StatementBack To Images
We cleared a path between
the slipping and this thing
still in the making
one between the summer ferns
and the mountain laurels, floating
down into the waterway of the old dam
a photograph of me and him
has come a long way
through the Rickety-Rackety Bridge
and the looking backwards
each generation walks the long path together
seeking a glimpse through the birches
and their height marked here, on the doorframe
the slipping and this thing
still in the making
one between the summer ferns
and the mountain laurels, floating
down into the waterway of the old dam
a photograph of me and him
has come a long way
through the Rickety-Rackety Bridge
and the looking backwards
each generation walks the long path together
seeking a glimpse through the birches
and their height marked here, on the doorframe
telling this story as a way of holding
as a way of becoming, together
the new camp, the old camp,
and gentle sky through the open door
I remember
a slow, sacred morning
and the warm light of day
I remember
names pressed into wooden floorboards
notes to mother, recipes in her handwriting
scrawled just one page back
do you know how words carry
to one another over the still lake
listen and watch the hills
reflected there, as you turn back
to the place of beginning