A River Far Away and Long Ago
The river
of my childhood,
that tumbled
down a passage of rocks
and cut-work ferns,
came here and there
to the swirl
and slowdown
of a pool
and I saw myself...
oh, clearly...
as I knelt at one...
then I saw myself
as if carried away,
as the river moved on
Where have I gone?
Since then
I have looked and looked
for myself,
not sure
who I am, or where,
or, more importantly, why.
It's okay...
I have had a wonderful life.
Still, I ponder
where that other is...
where I landed,
what I thought, what I did,
what small or even maybe meaningful deeds
I might have accomplished
somewhere
among strangers,
coming to them
as only a river can...
touching every life it meets...
that endlessly kind, that enduring.
~Mary Oliver~
