The Bank of a River

The Bank of a River

Oftentimes, I am held by my thoughts.
Filled, am I,
by drops of rain
until the river I am discovers
I am flowing over the crest.

Everything I have carried
from countless pathways
now seeps onto the landscape’s
endless pages.

What once was—
changed by this ‘spillage.’

Days pass and the waters recede.
Weeks slip by.
Months surge and the mighty
waters rush, ripple and settle.

In my later years,
I have gazed from the bank of the river
mindful how I arrived
to this place, to this time.

‘Thoughts’ gather once again,
and then, I look.
I see a tiny flower…

It has broken through the body of creation
that was once dripping from
the flood of so much unknown.

Unfolding in the sun’s radiance,
the flower unfolds.

It needs not ask
‘how did I come to this place?’

It matters little that no one notices
its miraculous beauty—
its soft perfumed earthy scent.

It becomes in the moments
of its existence, the dazzling
flower it was meant to be.

Nothing asked—
Nothing gained.

The flower did not have to do
anything except ‘grow’
into what it eventually became…

Ripening happened.

Now, a garden of flowers
lays silent along the shore—

A tender thought rises
and drifts on by.