An ode to our river at spate

*Spate: A U.K. term meaning flood, large influx of water, full of water, freshet, etc.

The river is deep and dark with mystery, danger, and expectation. It presses on your body and moves you. It surrounds you. The trees in skeletal state stand as patrons, ever watching. Voices come and go, created and swallowed by the black water.

Somewhere in that cold river waking from winter’s sleep moves a sleek form. Born to wander, the prodigal fish returns. So too, does my joy return. I immerse myself in the vast emptiness, and in that dark forbidding and cold water, find renewal. I cast my long line over the water with an offering, a hope of a connection to nature and some hidden or forgotten part of myself. Snowflakes tickle my nose, melt into drops of water, and join the billions of others flowing with authority to the lake.

My boots shuffle off the gravel and cobble. I bob through hidden holes as the water hisses around my waders. Where others find loneliness, I find harmony, in those waters as deep and dark as our souls.