We find cool places down
in crust crack narrow canyons.
River valley poplars weave and ebb
and this hidden river holds my interest.
It runs through shaded twists
and smells of must and mingled
blood on the tip of my tongue.
Light falling through these canyon walls,
profuses and obscures direction
so that that I could not claim
the water moves in both or neither ways.
And steady eyes are hard to hold on
any particular evidence.
It's waters feed two distant seas
both rich and warm of the great Northwest
and the wild, open tumult of the East
and I between
and ill at ease:
hear both raging, as oceans do,
hear salmon rush from continental shelves
then pulse beneath a single stream
thick, oily bodies colliding
and crossing paths in this deep bed.
Potent tension posesses.
I shut my eyes and bend to
touch dry skin to rushing water,
then ease my body in,
feel currents taking hold
and pull me racing down-
-river.
