I am hard pressed to describe
the slow glide of leaf shadows
gold-rimmed, along the brown bottom
of the glass-smooth, shallow river
They looked like a pod of something living —
One-celled protozoa, magnified many times
They moved like a companionable
group of friends,
drifting down an avenue, arm in arm
The leaves that made them were a different shape —
Pointed, narrow willow leaves
somehow projected into near-round ovals —
And the water’s surface held the leaves so thickly
that they darted from the probing
of my curious hand,
and clung to one another
unless I lifted one
clear away
The ripples that my hand made
radiated out in rings
of gold and shadow
moving slowly out along the river bottom
In my awe and wonder
I only later noticed
from its coolness and its freshness
that this was water
not a foreign substance —
something that I know.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 6, 2013