The Caving Grounds: Unmapped Subsidence Zones - Northern Magazine

When the man-car bumps the top of the shaft 
a little bell rings. Ding! Like dogs, the men pile out —
a crew of identically-dressed mancar triplets,
formed from mud, rolled in ore and rust
with a hardhat stuck on to show which end goes up
and muddy boots glued to the bottom.
C’mon, ladies, git out! shouts the foreman,
Whatcha waiting for, a parasol?

While father and uncles march to the showers
I'm motionless, sitting in the mancar's last seat, numb,
floating above my body looking down at it, pitying
the sore hands on my sore lap, aching back.
I must slam into myself I am waiting for it.
I dunno. I expected something more.

Rusty swore an oath to me, his refrain, in intimacy,
I'll turn to stone, he said, if we ever call it quits,
fine lexicon — & what did I hear each time he swore his oath?
I pictured some forlorn Laurentian outcrop,
Archean knuckle of greenstone worn by Lake Superior,
the rugged hump of Banded Iron behind his ma's house.
I'll turn to stone, he swore. Then didn't turn to stone,
only packed and turned and —

several floors below Negaunee, a low bell rang
as if someone was requesting service at the counter
of Salo's Meats, where the butcher lived upstairs.
That bell again, harder, impatient. Service please!
Anne Street's meadow rumbled, rumbled,
Helen Lahti's cows huddled at the center
like men in dark suits and white shires
riding an Otis elevator, Down! down —
I'd like to say that safety gates banged shut between
the meadow and the town, a fence sprang up
to keep children from falling in, sneaking down to swim,
but that took decades, didn't it?

((( I'd like to say I rode the rumbling meadow down
with Helen's cows and drove them safely home
but I'm a coward you know— )))

Things were sinking, kept sinking. 
Houses were relocated, bulldozed, pulled 
from Snow Street, from Michigan; some left Negaunee Mine location, 
heading east. Our cemetery was undermined — they shifted it. 
In sum, said Reverend Kemppainen, our very bones were moved.

Mudge says: me & Muck 
worked the Morris together, just a gate away 
from Barnes-Hecker. That was a wet mine, I tell you what! 
She ran down your collar the whole damn day and 
dripped into your dreams as well.

Aili shows me a picture of her house, shifted gentle as a wool-swaddled infant, says when the men came to move our house out of the Caving Grounds, they promised to be gentle, they said hey don't even bother — leave the pictures right there hanging on the walls. & Lila snorts, ha! that wasn't how it worked at all, or maybe it was different if you were the boss's wife, eh? & Ernie says: you seen our hole, right, old Athens? She's dropping fast. Look for a roof the next time you 're out there. That's the Dry** where we changed our clothes, clean things in baskets, hung like drying onions. Roof's all you'll see of it now, whole thing's going down —

- no picnic, only a gray blanket 
spread for lovers no longer in the meadow, 
who were not drinking wine 
nor looking deeply into each other's eyes; 
under the maple, in unmowed grass, 
a depression a deer might make, a trail of blood —
something wounded dragged through grass. 
We do not wish to consider it, old tragedies, 
wool and stains. Lee the red, if we find it, be wine 
spilled in passion. Don't forget there were lovers, 
think of your young father 
with an arm around your mother's slim waist, beaming and naïve. 
Let the shirt-wrapped bundle hold their sandwiches, 
slivered ham, ripe cheese, fragrant dark bread. 
Nothing wrapped in a blue tarp teeming; 
let nothing in our meadow hunger. 

O the lichens have their work cut out for them 
forgetting our names! & those worms waiting patiently 
all in a row, our mourners - I've seen their heaved tunnels, 
an iron-stained Night Shift of ghost worms in hardhats 
arriving at the half-subsided mine gate, ghost worms 
descending the steps into Athens Mine or 
picking their way down to Jackson Pit, single file, 
candles lighting the red scree - I don't 
wish to follow this dark verse further 
but will fulfill my duty, as the horse-drawn hearse 
has a box to deliver, as the sexton has a hole to fill.