Water Years by Elizabeth Gunn

 

upturned sterns, rust-rotted

barrels, fishery-bred

 

trout still swimming

in circles though freed

 

into Lake Mead –

down the way we toss popcorn

 

to wide-mouthed carp,

their mossy-green skin flipping

 

and slipping over surface

tension alongside the floating

 

dock mercifully pitching

here and there in the searing desert

 

night-break –

as if we could breathe and be

 

twin-like with the tiniest bend

of light, nourishing sea creatures

 

who cannot fully know the sea

nor the raw taste of rain nor see

 

why spawning begins in autumn –

and we cannot altogether

 

know love because it is born

of suffering amid astonishing

 

chaos – yet here we all are –

recognizing our way in this bestirring

 

and splendorous place where

love tugs at shared boundlessness