"The Same River" by Jeffrey Harrison

"Crooked Creek Rocks and Water" Aleta Karstad

Yes, yes, you can’t step into the same

river twice, but all the same, this river

is one of the things that has changed

least in my life, and stepping into it

always feels like returning to something

far back and familiar, its steady current

of coppery water flowing around my calves

and then my thighs, my only waders

a pair of old shorts. Holding a fly rod

above my head, my other arm out

for balance, like some kind of dance,

trying not to slip on the mossy rocks,

I make my way out to the big rock

I want to fish from, mottled with lichen

that has dried to rusty orange, a small

midstream island that a philosopher

might use to represent stasis

versus flux, being amidst becoming,

in some argument that is larger

than any that interests me now

as I climb out dripping onto the boulder

and cast my line out to where the bubbles

form a channel and trail off in a V

that points to where the fish might be,

holding steady amid the river’s flow.

"The Same River" by Jeffrey Harrison from Into Daylight. © Tupelo Press, 2014.