Moments after arriving at one of Owl Creek’s southerly bridges, I heard them: HOO-HOO, HOO-WHAAA! WHAA!
For once I’d arrived in time to witness the sunset, though obscured behind drooping trees along the riverbank, leaves brightened with yellow in the evening light.
I saw the sky reflected in dark pools below, more “green-gray bark waters” like those of the Verdigris River on Woodson County’s western edge.
A murder of crows adorned the scene, chiming in with the low roar of the baler and other haying equipment I passed down the road.
If you follow the creek southeast, you’ll eventually arrive near Humboldt, a trajectory roughly followed by many early residents who had “in-town” business.
And if you follow the creek northwest you can find the ruins of Durand and its depot, as well as South Owl Lake, better known as Yates Center’s “old” reservoir.
WHEN I SET OUT for somewhere to write in this area, what first came to mind were cemeteries: Pioneer graves like that of Emily Condict, who died in a carriage runaway accident, Owl Creek Lutheran and Catholic, or Linder-Orth, resting places of German immigrants and their descendants.
But then it dawned on me: Owl Creek is named for something very much alive, and its ghosts could wait.
Though one senses them everywhere.
I tried to imagine indigenous people especially, enter the dreamtime with eyes open, and saw them gathering water, fishing, and camping on the open prairie long before it was farmland.
I heard their songs commingling with those of the cicadas, the smoke from their fires blending with the golden-blue light.
WHOAAAA!!! the owl close to my left exclaimed. Do not forget about me! I, too, am part of this immortal choir!
Though I couldn’t see its face, I dreamed it square and brown, with piercing yellow eyes and sharp black beak.
She knows something about dreaming as well, this early-risen nightbird.
More than once I heard a fish break the water with a plop and a splash.
