The river spirit

Listen to the water and hear its story

Sometimes poetry just wants to be written, and I don’t have a say in it. I just hold the pen.

1:
Dressed in water coat,
rocks as my shoes,
feet light on the riverbed, dancing on pebbles,
green hair trailing sleepily behind me,
I am the river spirit.
The meandering is my body
the pulse my heart,
the reflections my soul.
I am mothered by the mountains,
I give birth to the sea.
 
I am beauty, I am fear
I am life and death,
light and darkness,
tingle of joy and chill to the bone.
I am the whisper, the roar,
the melody and the base drum.
I am never still, never the same.
Trust that I always and never can be trusted.
My currents feast on fallen firefly wings and broken hearts,
yet my pools comfort the dewinged and the heartbroken.
I am the girl born, and the boy drowned,
I keep both their souls in my bosom.
 
I am the gushing flood after hibernation,
stretching my limbs across the banks,
taking them by force.
I am the nursery of tadpoles and fry,
I poke pebbles awake with sun rays,
and paint a thousand mirrors on spawning trout.
I take tea with the clouds on days of grey.
I mutter in trickles under icy covers.
 
I have innervated these lands since time began,
I carry with me the stories of evolution,
of the peoples who have nurtured this land,
of goose, ant, mountain and moss. 
Listen and I will sing you all their songs.
I dance the meadows, paint the forests and break the morning.
I am life on earth,
the air you breathe
and the beating of your heart. 
I can take it all away –
dam me and I will damn you.
Don’t think you are more important than fern,
leech or water stride.
They were all here before you.
Care for me and I will rock you to sleep,
cradle you like a baby,
but if you vex me
I will break you like a twig.
I’ll call on my river sisters,
we will all outlive you.

2:
Your move.

The river in the picture is the Zeller Ache in Mondsee, Austria.