
Her Passing
Beauty
The Willamette
drifts slowly through town
her journey from mountain
to sea nearly over.
Soon she will join the
Columbia for the last long reach
of brilliant light and
rushing cloud, to give herself
to the surging bar and
broad ocean.
From a weathered rock
looking down into her
dark water
suddenly she offers a
glint of reflected light
on a metal bright scale
and lifts the nape of her
neck to the wind,
wanting me to notice
and love her passing
beauty.
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