What Stones in Rivers Remember

Stones remember, the first cold plunge in ice-melt currents hurling the sense of fear. They remember each bump, each grind, each sudden collision, that carved their surface to soft compliance, yielding to the drag. They remember the murmuring bobble, as gentler waters tumbled them together, stone on stone mumbling in the cobbled bed. They remember the drought years - sun cracking their dried backs, leaving flakes and crack lines, on once-smooth sides. They remember the roaring flood - how it tore them loose, spun them helpless downstream, to settle again in some strange, swirling eddy. They remember this when lifted, when held in the warmth of hand, that their surface, shape and feel, reveals the legacy, of every touch, gentle or jarring, of every bruise, bash and bump, the river has used to shape them thus.