On Wheeling IslandIf you ever drive east and want a good place
To stay and rest overnight at the base of the Alleghenies
Before ascending possibly the oldest mountain range
In the world
Stop in Wheeling, West Virginia
I can recommend the Best Western Motor Lodge
On the east bank of the Ohio River
Where the oldest suspension bridge in the US is
In fact the eastern vertical of this suspended marvel
Is almost touchable from the veranda of the lodge
Gigantic cables run from the support and are
Buried deep in tons of concrete beneath the street in front
Built 150 years ago, pre-Civil War, this bridge
Is not the main artery across the Ohio anymore
Interstate Route 70 runs across a newer bridge
About 200 yards north
But the old bridge is a difference of night and day
As the way to cross the big river to Wheeling Island
And I like to walk over it at dawn
From my room in the Best Western
It has been repaired and repainted in 1999
And was disappointingly closed my last trip east
So I took my morning walk across to Wheeling Island
On the newer bridge, a sterile experience
The new bridge, even with the pounding of
Many cars coming down from the mountains
Or going up into them
Is motionless under the weight
Whereas the old one, even with one car
Coming across while you're walking on it
Sways slightly, flexing on its ancient cables
And gives you to understand the tenuousness
A span that fell once when Union soldiers
Marched across in a heavy cadence
Too martial for the peacable lazy structure
It's something to feel in your groin
And think about on the way across
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Wheeling Island is loaded with pre-turn-of-the-century
Mansions and a panoply of lesser-degreed dwellings
All in a state of ill-repair except for scattered
Restorations going on, and I'm sure,more are to come
An economic page is yet to be turned there
But I love the crumbling age of it all
The brick sidewalks disheveled by tree roots
And the high porches and built-up homes to beat
Ohio River flooding that has washed over the island
Devastatingly from time to time
One commercial building has a gradient of high water marks
Recorded like a thermometer on its front façade
I have made the acquaintance of a few hunting cats
In those early morning hours
One golden one that I've seen there in an alley
Three years now in a row
I have taken my late father to Wheeling Island
And my fellow revolutionary Juan as well
And I would like to take you there to see all this
Quiet decaying charm
And one simple frame house is a highlight
Only an awninged window graces the front
The door is on the side
And it's all on top of a 5-foot flood foundation
A tiny and unprepossessing dwelling
Out of scale with the larger former-day homes
In its vicinity, but one thing arrests the eye
In passing on my walk
I see a small oval hand-painted sign
Hanging beneath the one front window on a rope
Tied to the window sill at a slight angle
Rakishly but proclaiming lovingly:
"An old fisher-man
lives here
with the catch of his life."
That is so touching to me I shudder
……Like the bridge
[DZD 2-14-00]
