I have not thought of you in so long.
Yet there you are in the foreground

of my grandmother’s painting
of her Vineyard beach cottage.

It’s still there. She’s not. Are you?
I don’t know

who owns the property,
who owns you, who owns

any of us. More marsh
than pond, you can own that.

The poodle always came home
with ticks in her tightly wound fur

after running through your eelgrass
wetland hem. Grandma gave you

a faded blue hue in contrast
to the turquoise sound behind

the house captured in an array
of grays and whites.

I wonder how you are doing.
What’s stirring within you:

turtles, various small fish,
a snake or two, herons waiting

in a tangle of willows beside you.
I’m embarrassed to say

I don’t know if you’re fresh
or salt. My grandmother knew.

I know you cannot reveal
the secrets she shared with you

as she walked along your banks.
Did she come to you to ask

for guidance about what to do
with her life when she was a teen,

spending summers at the nearby
Methodist campground?

You’ll never tell.

A forced loner as an only child,
she envied what she imagined

my sisters and I had growing up.
We all concoct stories

about other people’s exteriors
based on our own interior turmoil.

I imagine you once wished
to be a tidal estuary

with a permanent connection
to the ocean.

Dreams of boisterous, brackish
exchanges. You’ll never tell.

The map shows three other
Lily Ponds scattered across the island.

How lucky you are
to have so many sisters.

I write to my mother weekly.
Short notes with one or two thoughts,

a news item, always signed “Always.”
I can ask her what she remembers

about you. I make no promises.
Next time I’m on the island,

I will look harder for you
within the dramatic overgrowth

of evergreens and shrubs beyond
the ever-shrinking shoreline.