ANN ARBOR—Stories, essays, poems, maps, photographs, and illustrations celebrate the 130 miles of the Huron River as it runs from the Huron Swamp and Big Lake to the marshes of Lake Erie at Pointe Mouillee, passing through Oakland, Livingston, Washtenaw, Wayne and Monroe counties in Southeast Michigan.

Edited by John Knott, University of Michigan professor of English, and environmental writer and activist Keith Taylor, “The Huron River: Voices from the Watershed,” published by the U-M Press, presents visions and voices of the river’s past, present and its future. The Huron has maintained its present course for about 12,000 years and has evolved over that time as has its banks, marshes, bogs, vegetation, fish and fauna.

Even with the influx of concentrated development, the Huron is still considered a relatively healthy river, “generally regarded as the best in southeast Michigan,” the editors report. While the earliest settlers made their way from Detroit up the Huron by flatboat as far as what is now Belleville, today’s river traffic is comprised of mostly recreational canoes and kayaks of fiberglass.

“Several of our contributors explore the history of a particular part of the watershed, usually with an eye to its relevance to current issues and habits of living,” the editors write. “Some focus on the experience of canoeing or other kinds of boating, some on the rich natural life along the river, particularly on the opportunities for birding. Other portray human dramas that reflect and comment upon the places in which they unfold.”

Ken Mikolowski’s “View”

The view of the riverFrom the eighth floorUniversity HospitalRoom is not the sameAs from the ArboretumI guess it’s the perspective.

From Janet Kaufman’s “Buried Water,” a ballad by “An anonymous ‘Farmer'”If you are sad, with sickness worn, And have the headache every morn,Just come and drink a healing horn,Of Ypsilanti’s water.There’s forty new baths agoing,And all the healing waters flowing,Better days and health bestowing,On many a wear one.

It’s true, it has a woeful smell,But if your stomach don’t rebelIt’s just the thing to make you wellAnd praise up Ypsilanti.

From “Clamming on the Huron” and “Our Lady of the River” to “The Drowning of the Rhea” and “On the Huron River Drive,” the book offers new ways of looking at an old friend that will be with us for perhaps another 12,000 years.