Where We Are From: When Poetry Becomes Place
Living inside my son's words on the Kenai River, 19 years later
Tonight, Justin's photo opened itself in Lightroom to full size on its own—a moment captured on the Kenai River in Alaska during a vacation, his eyes reaching through time touching my heart, bringing love to smile in me.
I am immediately drawn to recall his poem, the one that his Poudre High School principal brought to our home the day after he died at 16, by suicide.
My dad read it at his funeral service. We played a song from the Lion King over and over at the vigil the night before. These touchstones of memory mark a mother’s heart who traverses healing the unexpected death of a child across nearly two decades.
Tonight, something familiar and welcomed occurs. It happens less often now. He speaks to me, music begins to play, or I find pennies, feathers, squirt guns, or hear his whisper.
Standing in the Alaska lodge I now own, my home at River Raven Sanctuary, writing this post, I feel his words reach through time. Halleluiah by Leonard Cohen begins to play. His poem carries me still, speaking with an uncanny prescience that continues to reveal itself, 19 years later.
Where I Am From
Justin Bernecker, 11/1/05
I am from the sweaty track jerseys
and smelly track shoes.
Tired muscles and over worked bodies,
Hard breathing that only comes from
hard work.
I am from the sweet smelling mountain
peaks of Colorado,
the dusty windswept deserts in Arizona
to the salty shores of Alaska.
I am from the neatly cut grass in
my backyard to the hammock
hanging between two trees.
The lonely rake that stands alone
against the wall, forgotten by
those who used it last.
I am from the cold lakes that gradually
warm in the summer,
to the boats that gently rock in the
gentle breeze blowing from the south.
To the fish that play in the shadows
of the trees, and the crawfish
that make their homes under the rocks.
I am from the fruit trees spilling over
with ripe fruit calling out to
be picked by young hands
to the boys sitting, laughing on the fence
posts, watching the cotton candy clouds
float by in that endless blue sky.
I am from the wheat fields that
gently sway in the summer wind
the sweat that comes in from cutting
wood all day under a blazing sun.
I am from the "Go on, do something outside"
type of family that raised me so well.
I am from the deer spaghetti, overflowing
With rich red sauce, to the traditional wild
turkey that we eat on thanksgiving.
The wild salmon that we catch off of the
river and smoke up at the lodge for the
guests to enjoy for their dinner.
This is who I am.
Moreover (his favorite word in high school essays), I find myself somewhat stunned, as I searched my MSWord files for Justin's "Where I Come From..." poem and first find a piece I wrote in more recent years, based on the file date, in 2018. Without conscious intention, I created my own response in this ongoing conversation, weaving his memory into my own tapestry of identity.
Synchronicity is a gift—how his words about "the salty shores of Alaska" and "wild salmon" seem to have predicted the path that would eventually lead me here, to this sanctuary by the river. How love indeed transcends time and space, creating patterns we often may only recognize in retrospect.
Where I Am From...
Pegge, 2018
I am from salty Pacific Ocean waves coming ashore where I'd lie baking in sunrays, lemon juice streaking long, straight, chlorine rinsed hair.
I am from oven-warm Ranger cookies and we do it this way here, to spell it again: S-U-C-C-E-S-S, and lugging the three-foot leather cased saxophone up the hill to 5th grade, Tuesdays and Thursdays, for one year.
I am from the three boys who invite me to hang-out on that schools-out-for-summer Friday and I think sipping a beer and smoking a joint is what cool kids do, but I forget or don't think to question, why am I the only girl here? and then he violates my, "no, no, no…"
I am from the woman who stood still against the Volkswagen bug, and later the brown closet doors, when his blurred eyes slurred her heart and a right hand socked to either side of her face
I am from the high desert fathers and mothers, and chapel bell solitude, the way holy stillness permeates my cells, and the pigeon, seagull, and eagle feathers become bouquets, and pink Sherman granite rocks stack in balanced symmetry.
I am from my NO after 17 years of scorn filled dismissiveness cushioned by, I adore you, no matter what vows.
I am from the boy who wrote the "I Am From…" poem his school principal presented to us at the front door, the morning after a bullet stole his breath.
I am from the wild salmon fertilizing the Alaska Kenai River, the orphaned moose who found shelter beneath alders on my wooded hillside with a view, the two wild turkeys who race to greet me upon my return,
and the woman who says, Yes, Yes, Yes, to Papohaku Beach translucent salt water, plumeria, and cursive ink on page after page after page.
I am she who will not die.
Looking at these poems side by side, I see the threads that connect us still—the outdoor adventures, wild salmon, the turkeys, the terrain of Colorado giving way to the shores of Alaska.
His words live in mine; my journey somehow anticipated in his.
His final declaration of "This is who I am" echoes in my own defiant closing line: "I am she who will not die." In these parallel affirmations, I find a circle completing itself, as if he knew something of the strength I would need to find, the woman I would become. And the truth is, we’ve been walking time, together.
I'll revisit this exercise again this week—perhaps you'll join me to start with "Where I Come From..." and be open and curious about what is revealed. Then give yourself a hug and celebrate beautiful you.
Peace to you...
I love the echoing, the call and response rhythm of your poem and Justin's, the weaving. Wonderful idea to share them together. I wonder if you could listen deeply and softly, could you hear the I am from poem he might write now, from where he is. . .may do a bit of directed writing?
🙏🙏💗