The Old Aqueduct
It juts out by the river road,
traffic passes it each morn,
what’s left of the old aqueduct,
something stately, yet still forlorn.
The rock, with no mortar, was set
so fine it would make Incas proud,
precise enough to still hold up
today, and centuries from now.
There’s a display with a picture
of how it looked in days of old,
twenty arches spanned the river,
hand-built by men flinty and bold.
On it ran the Erie Canal,
crossing the rough Mohawk below,
on barges towed by stubborn mules,
the trips were long, steady, and slow.
This once helped open the Midwest
to settlers, to goods and trade,
but that’s a different country now,
and long ago such things did fade.
The roads and rails brought prices down,
and moved much quicker than a mule,
they went and dammed the river up,
much wider than some man-made pool.
That fact, alas, would be its end,
the arches blocked the way of boats,
and in the winter jammed the ice,
so floods onto spring banks would flow.
They blew up all the arches grand,
only those by the shore remain,
buried half of that great canal,
now barely known, save for the name.
Those who still use the aqueduct
are kids leaping into the drink,
someday they’ll try to shut that down,
claiming that it’s a ‘safety thing.’
And the arches that look just like
something made back in ancient Rome,
will be like all great things men built,
reduced to naught but broken stone.
Copyright ©
David Welch
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