I am so pleased to be able to post this poem submitted by poet Ronald C. Downie, who is also the Chairman of the Pottstown Borough Authority. He sent it in response to a recent article about Sanatoga Park in our Parks & Rec Series. Thank you, Ron!
The Park
Marble sized for giants – whose
Muscles lugged huge stones here ,
Epoch sung through harmonic echoes ,
Waiting with hammer and an ear ?
Glacier droppings thawed to earth
In retreat of Ice Age nights ,
Was Hudson Bay their place of birth
Under Aurora Borealis lights ?
Bare footed , shirtless , agile
Rock climbers scout to find
Cave caverns and weathered fossil
Prints of what beastly kind .
Zig zag stairs to the tower ,
Which commands a southern view ,
Potts’s dream , factory power ,
Blue collar through and through .
They board to ride steel ribbons
Through fields of yellow and green ,
Their voices join track rhythms ,
Up hills , blue skies , at pleasures dream .
Round and round swiftly sweep
Four roller shoes , they in circles flow
To ebony platters etched needle deep
Of organ music for their graceful show .
People recreate at Nature’s door :
Wooded oak hill of ringing rock ,
Pavilion roofed with hardened floor ,
Strengths of family from human stock .
At ” This Wonder Of The World ”
Which Ripley took time to note –
All the Twentieth Century unfurled –
May memories stir by this that I wrote .
( Ringing Rocks Park, Lower Pottsgrove Township, Montgomery County )
Ronald C. Downie
(I wrote this poem 20 years ago when I wanted to record where we played in the mid-1940′s. The park was closed a decade earlier but this didn’t deter me and my friends from enjoying what was still left even if it was, as the tower stairs, fenced off.)
Positively Pottstown blog 