Water Ways

Photo: (c) Jamie K. Reaser

I took form in this aqueous place, this place of 

tentative buoyancy,  in this life, decades ago, in 

other lives, perhaps, long since, in ways that I 

cannot understand but some part of me

recalls as belonging.

As a child, I meandered in brooks, turning over 

rocks for crayfish and salamanders, salamanders 

that still had gills, indicating that they were still 

young in the way that we are still young.

And, in the summers, I went to the beach, where 

waves taught me how to take hold and how to let go, 

and where I learned that I am ruled by the moon at 

least as much as the sun and other stars.

Have you ever noticed how the moon has chosen 

water to hold her reflection, only water?

I am not a fish, but I have looked into the eyes of fish, 

many. I am not a whale, but I have looked into the eyes 

of whales, a few, and each time I find myself there. Other 

orbs too. Like blue marbles that sparkle iridescent in the 

sunlight and in the gleaming of those who hold them 

between thumb and forefinger.

Have you ever noticed that when you walk up to a fountain 

with pennies in your pocket in a grand city or some out of 

the way little town that your heart beats differently than it 

did the moment before you stepped onto the bricks, or 

cobblestones, or asphalt that led you there?

Rain. A metal roof. That’s enough.

I have had relationships with puddles that are deeper than

with those who have called themselves family, some who

have called themselves friends.

You? When was the last time you jumped in one?

What was the point of this story?

It had something to do with water, how in water you can

drift back and away, and how despite – but I believe because of –

this drifting, this floating, this letting go of some proverbial

shoreline, you can come back from some place remembering

every thing, everything, that is essentially you.

~ Jamie K. Reaser, Author

From "Wonderment: New and Selected Poems" (a work in progress)

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