Loosed

Just how tenuous are those silvan spider silks that keep my arms bound to my sides, and what sort of dulcet spider spins so sweetly, like a perfect poisoned red apple, like a girl singing to her reflection in a well.

I traversed the river this morning as the swallows were singing, water to my knees, water to my waist, water to my neck. The farthest channel deceptively swift, flying the last of Spring's detritus past the headlands to the sea. Four more steps, six more steps, slick green moss threading through my toes and the current will take me. To the channel, where the water churns, and the ocean beckons. Six more steps to be swept away.

Instead I watched birds, instead I ate bacon and eggs, instead I went to a rodeo. And then I drove home and discussed the space/time continuum with a trio of eight year old boys.

And all the while the sun is on my face and the river is at my back, cold and strong. The current pulls, a song as fine as silt, loosed, we are loosed.

Loosed towards the sea and worn trajectory, loosed from rivulets and streams, loosed of torrents and swollen creeks, bled from roots and blades of grass, stricken from petals and wet dogs and sewage. All of that water pooled from snowy peaks and puddles on rooftops, called home again to crash upon the shore.