poem "La Crosse on the River"

I've been there too many times to count.
70 miles each way.
By the time I was in second grade,
I estimated I'd logged a thousand miles; just there and back,
in short spurts;
as Gallons are lost to the dripping faucet.
What I mean to say is I've been to La Crosse.

Especially in this season,
I miss the red apples
in La Crescent--the kind
of apple you can only buy
at Bauer's Market.
La Crescent is just across the river.

Yet I have placed too many rivers between
time and place
to go back to La Crosse.

Still, every time I hear
that old Credence Clearwater Revival song play, "I never knew..."
'til I hitched a ride on a riverboat queen...
the people on the river are happy to give,"
I know it's true.

Sure, when they used to play it in La Crosse, I'd just laugh.
They played it every other song, it seemed.
Either that or the Tina Turner version.

But La Crosse on the river;
it isn't the same as the one
that's in my mind,
yet just as the river,
it meanders
and everyonce in awhile
flows through to find.

and suddenly I am there;
time and space irrelevant;
life without a care

in La Crosse
on the River;
the one I know

its waterlilies bloom in my mind