From a cleft in sharp rock
in the high country
water emerges from the mountain
to shine on lichen and wet a small stream
where swifts and marmots drink.
Gathering strength and falling,
brown rocks glisten, birds gather,
fish appear in circling eddies,
one stream reaching into another,
merging in deep ravines
to fall out over stone ledges
alive with sunlight and oxygen
into the confluence.
River then bears the weight
rolling great stones along the bottom,
feeding fish on their path home
with herons tall and brooding along the banks.
Hawks circle above the broad stripe of water,
the grasslands alive with rich bottom.
Joined and joining, slopes easing
until the broad flats of sand and silt
where the original people once lived.
Beside painted rock and towering fir,
out onto the broad reach
where the bar meets the sea
in one undaunted wave
with stories of mountain,
crow and coyote, steelhead
and salmon given to the ocean,
ravenous for all the river will tell.
