All of It, and Us

 

All of It, and Us

I think my family really was an estuary, like the river
flowing beside us always, down a hill or two, by the
Manhattan-bound trains. Our salt line just as various

as the Hudson's: at New York Harbor or all the way up
to Newburgh. Who was ready to blow his stack? Who
was only mildly vexed? See the mercurial, shimmering

double tides connecting us to the world, we WASPS
who have buried our parents here for generations? Saline,
sweet—who knew unless you were deep into it? I was,

long before I even could have begun to say so. The icy,
radiant platinum of winter sun, the gentle splat of May
rain. Anything. Everything. Herons, dolphins, shad, carp,

bass, the deactivated nuclear power plant, a scatter of
old houses no longer owned by relatives, their light-
struck windows ablaze with sunset. All of it, and us. Us.