He senses danger and is gone,

the water bulging in his wake.

You needn’t ever count upon

this sight again, and so should take

the memory and then move on?

 

You’ll never know what rendezvous he’ll break

with liquid arabesques – nor how he’ll trawl

fresh eddys, find new shoals to dredge.

His underwater playgrounds call

within him like a lover’s pledge.

He’ll wear the river like a shawl

in slicked–back freedom, near the water’s edge.