Now even the river has changed, but not the memory.




River Cats

 

Poems of time

now, and time then, each

containing the other carefully.

     Linda Gregg, "Winning"

 

 

  

At the river's edge the late afternoon light

Floats on the brown water here and there,

The current like a calico cat licking its fur,

Lifting its back as it leans against the legs

Of the dock . . . but there is only the surface

Of movement while the real river stays still

In its snags of flooded trees and sinkholes.

 

I remember coming here as a child, stolen

Bread brought to where I was to never go

Alone, throwing it out like a net, and what

Stirred in that mud and water, blacker than

The water, was something fierce and in some

Impossible way shimmering, something old

As the river, the unchanging deepest part,

 

Ponderous and viscid, undulant and evil,

Surely too heavy to rise, but it does, slowly,

Knowing that for us time does not matter,

That the bread would wait, and I not move.

Sixty years some part of me has been here,

Drawing closer each year to the deep water,

Dark river, so near now to crossing over it.





Poetry by countryfog
Read 593 times
Written on 2015-04-19 at 17:32

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Lawrence Beck The PoetBay support member heart!
I enjoyed the poem overall, Fog. I loved this line:

Ponderous and viscid, undulant and evil,

Oh, the places one could go with a line like that!
2015-04-22



A powerful piece, my friend. I admire your focus on the movement of the river – the calico cat simile especially – together with your childhood memories, the feast of adjectives beginning the final verse, and the sombre close.
Applause!
2015-04-20



I feel the same about the rural area where I grew up. It's all changed now--houses all over the place--but I remember it just as it was then. As you say, it changed, but I grow closer to it every day. Sometimes it seems as if I can remember every pine tree, every blade of grass, every meadow-flower.
2015-04-20


Jamsbo Rockda The PoetBay support member heart!
How wonderful. The real river monsters. What a nice read :)
2015-04-20


josephus The PoetBay support member heart!
Those big blue tailed river catfish are ominous; all muscle and sleek skin. We would sometimes catch one on our lines fishing for Pearce in the Detroit River. They broke our lines in most cases. We also sometimes caught Fresh water salamanders called mud puppies that we considered nasty but not as fearsome as the large cats. Thanks for taking me back to the great adventures of wild boys and our adventures growing up on the river. My heart as yours has never wandered far from it bank.
2015-04-19