[potsie]

I grew up in ice-fishing country and there would always be ice hut drama, especially as winter wore on and the weather got warmer. This verse conjures up images in my mind of the fishermen and locals figuring out how to rescue those ice huts that occasionally broke through the ice. Now I don't know what Gord was thinking when he wrote this, but I see the "worthy men and the fiercest architects" as a tongue-and-cheek yet reverent nod to these guys -- working class men dressed in their plaid jackets, wearing toques, smoking darts working to haul out a sunken ice fishing hut. For me this is an example of why Gord's lyrics resonate so deeply with Canadians. Of course, a major part is the overt references to Canada (hockey, specific places, etc.) but I think it goes so much deeper than that. It's an awareness of the geography that defines Canada and its people. The seasons, the landscape. Gord evokes images of these things and the emotions they generate. I hear him speak to these things with reverence. They're important. They define us. And it's all open to interpretation, of course, which makes it great poetry. Again who the hell knows what he was thinking when he wrote this, but for me it paints a picture of something I specific I identify with - something perhaps uniquely Canadian. A lot of Gord's lyrics do that.

*clapping*... that is just beautiful. Well written, Moof_Milker!