A Brook in the City

The recent article in the New York times on the daylighting project at Tibbetts Creek reminded me, based on some of the comments, of the poem by Robert Frost called “A Brook in the City”. I knew of the poem, but hadn’t really made the connection to hidden hydrology, but the tones of industrialization that . Some analysis of the poem explains the context, as the poem “was written somewhat in early 1920 when history was witnessing Industrial Revolution and urbanization. It was at that time man became an evil and the outcome was the devastation and extinction of nature.”

The brook becomes the symbol for that devastation, and the domination of nature the culprit: “…because of man’s modernization the brook which was a symbol of force is now nothing more then a weak and meek sewer. At night it still flows. A time would come when people would forget that there was a brook which existed. It would only exist on maps. The poet wonders if man could ever ever understand his mistake.”

An interesting piece of poetry that hits at the root of loss, memory, and the essence of hidden hydrology. Sad and beautiful, be still resonant a century after it was written, and somewhat poignant to consider as we daylight and restore the brooks… reversal of some of that old wounds made right. Enjoy.

A Brook in the City – Robert Frost

The farmhouse lingers, though averse to square
With the new city street it has to wear
A number in. But what about the brook
That held the house as in an elbow-crook?
I ask as one who knew the brook, its strength
And impulse, having dipped a finger length
And made it leap my knuckle, having tossed
A flower to try its currents where they crossed.
The meadow grass could be cemented down
From growing under pavements of a town;
The apple trees be sent to hearth-stone flame.
Is water wood to serve a brook the same?
How else dispose of an immortal force
No longer needed? Staunch it at its source
With cinder loads dumped down? The brook was thrown
Deep in a sewer dungeon under stone
In fetid darkness still to live and run—
And all for nothing it had ever done
Except forget to go in fear perhaps.
No one would know except for ancient maps
That such a brook ran water. But I wonder
If from its being kept forever under,
The thoughts may not have risen that so keep
This new-built city from both work and sleep.

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Header image – excerpt of woodcut from J.J. Lankes from another Frost collection of poem, “West Running Brook” – via Book Porn Club