Click below to listen to the narration:
from coast to coast the heat and winds ran…and rivers rose through thawing stone…the alto rails met troubled ground…yet still the country dreamed its own…a wide spun arc from sea to sky…held by the hands that will not shy…the storms along the maritimes…broke culverts deep in valley bends… and volunteer crews braved the floods…to guide their neighbours, kin and friends…while acadian songs in summer squares…kept faith alive in salted air…the cities sweltered under heat… small towns cooled elders in their halls…and alto’s promise met its snags…where farmers feared the corridor’s sprawl…yet voices rose in council rooms…to guard the fields where futures bloom…the wheat stood patchy in the sun…canola bowed to thirsty skies…and grassfires flared along the roads…met swiftly by volunteers’ cries…still prairie towns held steady ground…with co op dreams that circle round…the smoke returned to inland hills…and ferries strained with summer crowds…harbour towns filled every night…beneath the mountains’ hazy shrouds…yet coastal winds in twilight’s glow…sang stories only shorelines know…the northern trucks ran slow this week…supplies delayed by shifting ground…contract crews were stretched too thin…but camps kept circling safe and sound…and every mile of rugged track…held echoes of the old pack sack…the permafrost gave way again…pipes bent under the thawing earth…and flights were stalled by storms and cold…delaying elders bound for care yet drum dance nights in midnight sun…restored the youth to ancient runes…so roll the stones from town to town…from rural roads to northern air…for every strain the week revealed…was met by hands that choose to care…and through the land from east to west…the quiet heart beats manifest…