~
from A Girl’s Life On The Mississippi
Living near the Father of All Waters establishes kinship by association. You are a relative of infinite change and wonder.
What does change look like?
Where does change begin?
What shape does it take?
What form does it make?
Flotsam, jetsam, spiral eddies, jazzy waves and bars of sand, wing dams, locks and dams, docks and bits of floating architecture bob and weave by force of an invisible volume transforming all aspects with currency and change.
Merging and emerging, everything drifting from someplace to somewhere beneath rhythmic, constellation stars.
Unexpected arrivals. Unscheduled departures. Will this message in a bottle reach far away shores?
I am home when the moon writes is name across the river’s inky waters beaming sunlight through the dark of night.
I am awakened by the aroma of the river’s primordial brew: creation soup of catfish and clam, arrowroot and water lily seasoned with sprinkle of fresh cloud and a dash of lightning.
I am home when the river plays the blues; indigo, azure, mirror of deep space, astoundingly beautiful, astonishingly luminous and timeless in its rhapsody.
The river can take your breath away.
Nancy Purington, 2009 |
