Away, Away

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Can you feel it; that silver river slipping away, away, wild beneath our feet?

That river slumbered then, where we played

And cooled ourselves in its bronzing shade

For the summer was long and we were young

And hungry for more than the years that stung

Our tongues with Want and wishful wondering

We heard the taunt but not the thundering

Of waters coursing and forcing our feet

Away, away, from youth’s forever-street

There day-dreams grew fat as the years that crawled

Where the hours sat on tree-limbs soft-scrawled

On the palm of a lazy afternoon

We sprawled with our toes a-top the moon

And noses in books; bored desperation

Urged us aboard paper transportation

On the tide of nothing-to-do we sailed

While the white winds blew and the roses paled

Now the river that crept past child-hood homes

Rushes and pushes and gushes and foams

Carrying seasons like a little leaf

Away, away from idle make-belief

Still, here and there, as the sun sinks pink-slow

Splashing twilight’s hair with the afterglow

Caught in a girl’s laughter, soft stirs the snore

Of a river that slept at our front-door

© Janet Martin