Riverkeeper

Wanting to be that place where inner

and outer meet, this morning

I’m listening to the river inside—

also to the river out the window, river

of sun and branch shadow, muskrat

and mallard, heron, and the rattled cry

of the kingfisher. Out there is a tree

whose roots the river has washed so often

the tree stretches beyond itself, its spirit

like mine, leaning out over the water, held

only by the poised astonishment

of being here. This morning, listening

to the river inside, I’m sinking into a stillness

where what can’t be said stirs beneath

currents of image and memory, below strata

of muons and quarks, now rushes, now hushes

and pools, now casts a net of bright light

so loosely woven there’s a constellation

afloat on the surface of the river, so still

I can almost hear it weave in and out—

interstellar, intercellular—and isn’t it

truly all one, one world, no in or out, no here

or there, seamless, as a lily about to open

from just here into everywhere, is. Just is.

Restful lily. Lucky lily. To bloom must feel

like a river’s brightening at daybreak,

or a slow kiss, a throb in the elapse of time,

a shudder of heron shadow flying over

shallows that are merely the apparent

skim of a depth whose bottomless surface

seeps everywhere, bloom and retraction,

an anchored flow that upholds city

and cathedral, bridge and gate,

Orion, odd toad in the Amazon, blue dragonfly,

what it is to love... Spoil a river, you spoil all this.