A Shallow Creek To Nowhere

In flood the creek is still a walk over. A limp washing of the land, a hesitant flow, never meant to be a tributary, or delta of anything at all. The opaque water slides through low, then after a few miles, seeps into a wallow of bottomland. It recently has been given a name, a new housing development built beside its muddy banks is called, Silver Water Creek. On my bookshelf, between Twain’s, Huck’ Finn and ‘Life on the Mississippi’, are several stones plucked from its narrow waters. They are flat and smooth, but can be read. I see the scrimshaw of a rivering. a trip taken to nowhere in particular, then I see my own disappearing.