Fish

fowl

flood

Fish
fowl

flood

Water lily mud

My life

in the leaves and on water

My mother and I

born

in swale and swamp and sworn

to water

Larine Niedecker (1903-70) lived on Black Hawk Island most of her life and celebrated

the sights and sounds of this place in poems ranked among the 20th

Century's finest. She lived first in the log sided house and later in the house near

the river from 1947-70.

Nobody, nothing than time

ever gave me unless light

greater thing and silence

which if intense

makes sound