The Polar Bear Plunge

For whatever reason, a group of local poets make a habit of reciting poetry and then diving into sub-zero waters. A selection of what was seen and heard at Green Lake on December 11, 2009.

Poets Julie Lane and Noah Star prepare for the plunge.
Photography by Mike Kane

you came out of the twinkling sky
written & read by A. K. Allin, "The Poetess at Green Lake"

 
once long ago
the sky shattered
&it fell &fell &fell
it fell for a very long time
years later
it began to impact
a tiny blue planet below
&when it did
it made a tinkle-twinkle-tin sound
upon the ocean
&upon the land
&all the twinkling
set the boats up
into the arms of clouds
with a whew-wee-woah
but the clouds were thin
&dropped them back down again
into dark green valleys of waves
eventually though
the seas began to settle
&there came a light
first a bluehaze
then a shock of yellowblue
then white everywhere white
thin hairs &thick carpets
&glass tubes &round balls
like a christmas star white
&the little sailors
mostly women
in their little boats
mostly bristol channel cutters
began to harbor themselves in this white &they built wooden shapes there in cozy anchorages they called
them home &in the very center of each they built a hearth from those sprung stories &poems & songs
one of which was you

Written across Noah's stomach: "it does seem crazy / but never fear / it's warmer in there / than it is out here!"

I who all the winter
by Robert Louis Stevenson, read by Dr. Clinton Bliss
 
I who all the winter through
Cherished other loves than you,
And kept hands with hoary policy in marriage-bed and pew; Now I know the false and true, For the
earnest sun looks through, And my old love comes to meet me in the dawning and the dew.
 
Now the hedged meads renew
Rustic odour, smiling hue,
And the clean air shines and tinkles as the world goes wheeling through; And my heart springs up anew,
Bright and confident and true, And my old love comes to meet me in the dawning and the dew.

David Kuhns leads the charge.

Polar Bear Is not a Dip
written and read by Dave Kuhns
 
It was, I think
New Year’s Day, 1971
When I stood on the brink
Of a frozen, sub-zero Lake Michigan.
 
I, then just a teen,
Dove in for the lark
Didn’t know what it’d mean
On the shores of Doctor’s Park.
 
Now, decades have past,
And I, a much older, wiser man
Have returned again, at last,
To take the plunge while I still can.
 
So why do I again come freezing
On a cold, sunny winter’s day
With nose running, lungs wheezing?
Because I have something to say!
 
It’s life’s lesson learned taking the plunge Decades past, at 10 below Run in, leap, dive, lunge!
Don’t take it slow! Go. Go! GO!