Wednesday, March 15, 2023

 All Text, Music, and Illustrations, including Paintings, Photographs, and 3D models, Copyright © 2022 by Jim Robbins.

San Joaquin River Gorge


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TAG BY THE RIVER



They twirled me around

ten times at the edge

of the campground,

then scattered—I


swayed a little before

lunging at them, each one

vanishing into deer brush

by the river, the water


roaring into a still,

deep pool, then

sweeping around a bend,

a phoebe chirping, barely


out of my reach, on a twig

above the shining edge

of the pool and the rapids.

Tempted to forget the game


and swim across, the water

smooth for a stretch,

then pitilessly raging,

I glimpsed my brother,


fifty feet away, scrambling

as if his life depended

on it, and I sprinted

after him, twenty feet


away before he

disappeared into

the brush again, and I

gave up. Again,


I had failed.

As I leaped

across a stream,

my friends seemed


so distant, impossible

to tag. Two feet away,

the water raged, the sun

kindling my ribs,


the river and earth so

peaceful that I felt,

for the first time, one

with the bushes and trees,


aware that my soul

was ballooning, connected

with something vast, unseen

the great spirit of the earth,


I imagined. I no longer desired

anything else. My brother finally

found me and scornfully

asked where I’d been,


and we marched back to camp

where I glimpsed in the distance

the shining edge of the still pool

and the pitiless rapids.







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    All Text, Music, and Illustrations, including Paintings, Photographs, and 3D models, Copyright © 2022 by Jim Robbins. Two of Pentacles: ...