Author Archives: uvlocalvores

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Many of you may know Frank Gould, Co-Chair (with Paul Coats) of the MRG project, friendly MRG promoter at the Leb Farmers Market, and someone working hard to solve the problem of access at both ends of our Mascoma River Greenway .  .  . trying to make connections

Connections Count

The river twists itself,

coiled like an upset snake

beneath the railtrail bridge.

I watch it slither away,

beyond the oaks and maples

which shadow grasslands,

after slipping east through

neighborhoods and woods.

I walk beyond the bridge

along the rail corridor

where trains at one time

carried freight, passengers

and American life into

the valleys of our village.

Today, the trains are gone.

Its corridor is transformed,

derailed, cleared and paved;

a greenway to give locals

access to their community,

to their health, to their self,

to their American life.

Today they find this path

for comfort and calm,

for daily, scenic exercise.

They stroll their new-born;

bicycle with their kids;

walk to a grocery store

and home with filled bags.

They’ve found their walk

or ski to movies, to eat out,

or to their jobs and back.

Rush-hour traffic absent.

They visit friends they meet,

talk about the friendly walk,

and wonder why the trail

closes at dysfunction junction?

Why shopping malls exist

only well beyond trail’s end?

How might we reach out, they

ask, to unfold our community?

                        Frank Gould   2017