I come across a shelter by the creek,
a well-hidden shelter, built against and under
an enormous stone at the bottom of a cliff,
not easily observable from the opposite clifftop,
not easily accessible, except by two creek crossings.
It was the row of Canadian flags that caught my attention
as I hopped from rock to rock, waded through
fast-moving water, my poles planted for balance.
A lantern hangs from a beam,
long thin logs tied together in a row for a roof,
boards laid atop logs for seating.
Is that a makeshift bed I see in the back?
No one is home.
I wonder who made this shelter, and for what purpose.
It would have taken some work getting all the
bits and pieces of the shelter across the creek.
I imagine it is a man who made this shelter,
a man in his early forties, married with children
and a high-stress job he doesn’t like.
I imagine he sits alone in the living room at night
trying to remember when he was last happy.
He realizes he was happiest when he had nothing,
no money, no prospects, no permanent address,
but when all of the world was promise.
He couldn’t go back to that life with his current responsibilities,
but he wanted to recreate it, a sort of temporary poverty,
to find balance, to find harmony, to feel tranquil.
I do not enter the shelter;
it feels like sacred ground, not in a holy context,
but in a profoundly personal one.
This is a place where peace is found.
I leave it as I found it, untouched.
