June- October
10/5
Dream of a summer camp: pick berries with kids. Lake. No breaks. Big old Forest Service hall. Mom helps me set up my tent in the rain and wind, some quick sun–hot dogs, sad
9/24
nettle flowers, woodpecker
9/16
Rainy road to a canyon trail. No gear, soaked (remembering the bull trout, my mom and dad– soon, soon). That drive also– foggy, deep pool— green with a little stirring
9/9
Invisible river down the cul-de-sac. Dad’s got a big one. Bite the line to let it go–white salmon pale as a crab spider, the ghost leashed to walk
8/20
I’d spend my whole life this way– man’s first cast, he catches a little trout, yells for his daughters– fish slips off. They say you’re a liar. I say I saw, I saw
8/15
swallows, swallows
8/08
sometimes I am afraid of how much I love
7/29
My grandma in a beautiful cheap motel in a logging yard parking lot. Starry night diner. Wood-paneled. Ferny. Stringlit. She went down the steep stairs I couldn’t descend
6/15
I fished so long ago. Lightning ahead. On the rain
Raised in Portland, Oregon, Sam Olson writes in and about the Pacific Northwest. He holds an MFA in Poetry from Oregon State University, where he teaches writing courses. Find his poems and essays in Portland Review, Bluestem, and Watershed Review, among others.
