Eno River Walking

Eno River in Durham, NC

 

This place with birds calling to one another,

the slow whir of river walking upon

age-worn rocks from another life,

red clay sinks down, accepts, slides,

green thorns covered with promises of spring,

snow like winter’s ghost melts into the earth.

The river runs and walks, then runs again,

as quiet eyes of trees observe

passing of time

passing of years

dropping their leaves down

sap rising

budding

shooting forth into fullness

the color and splendor of death

as falling leaves come anew.

But now, now their blood,

their heartbeat pumps stronger

after long, unconscious sleep.

The deer have eaten at bark and branch

during winter’s starving bite,

but now, now from roots

spread forth green blades,

speared desires for sun and air.

This place is open

and intimate

the pebbles and small shells

mingle together like brothers and sisters

at the river edge,

each stone a story past, each shell a life long gone.

This place with its tall trees,

buckeye and oak: white, blackjack and laurel.

This place with holly, rhododendron, sycamore,

white ash, maple and beech, the trembling beech,

walnut, pecan, wild thorn, alder and dogwood,

sourwood and ironwood, honeysuckle,

a thick array of river birch, cedar and hemlock.

This place with grasses, grasses and grasses,

moss and lichen, ivy, sumac and creepers,

shooting bulbs wild with spring’s coming day.

And pine trees, who could not mention the pine trees,

short-leafed pine in bunches with loblolly pine drooping down,

long-leaf pine that needs fire to seed, fire to be freed,

ancient giants that covered this place long ago,

pine-cones everywhere before deciduous trees took root.

A sparrow peers at me now,

querying my intentions in this place,

then carries on, moves along feeding off the ground,

dancing with a hop in his step,

his lover nearby,

their white breasts glimmering

beneath brown wings and

gleaming eyes.

I am breathless,

breathless

at this place,

at its rolling sides rising up into blue sky,

this valley, this river course,

this place of cosmic lineage,

about to awaken to Spring again

like all other years — yet unlike ever before.

The joy that fills me

reminds me of home,

tells me I’m home,

tells me to walk softly on this clay,

to slip with it and slide with it,

to feel the leaves, the bark, the dead grass, new grass,

smooth stone, volcanic etrusions,

woodpecker in the distance amidst creaking trunks.

I know this place in my dreams,

have known it for many years,

but this place is real,

this place breathes,

it lives,

carries with it memories

sinking in,

sinking into me,

seeping in like blood and breath,

like scent on the wind.

In this moment,

there is no me.

Woods, river, birds, shore,

the silent white-footed mouse staring at me from his hole

as he melts into grey rock light,

blurring his edges,

not mouse, but stone,

not stone, but mouse.

So too I melt

dissolve

blend into hues of green and brown.

I am earth and wind,

murmur of water as it kisses stones,

tree-creeper hopping, moving up bark paths,

wren in the distance shrieking his warning,

rising rocks emerge from the hillside,

winding their way along a river’s long walk

all this I am,

all this flows in me and through me,

the Eno River walking and running, then walking again,

part and whole,

whole and part.

This place is real.

This place is home.

Note: The Eno River is my native North Carolina watershed … the rocks here stretch back 600 million years and are very deep, not only in my mind, but in this place's psyche too.