Floating Down the River

Submerged in rivulets
of undulating millefiori bean shapes
refracting vigorously verdant overgrowth
while little-bo-peep clouds, puffed, also float
in strong blue hue above, and underneath,
macrame light nets coppery rocks, anchoring them.
 
But on the surface
dapples shift and converse,
one color streak jostles with the next,
chatting, swapping places and rippling into tiny swirls,
like lugubrious dance partners, barely holding hands:
viridian and gold, ochre and olive, azure and pale lavender.
 
An enormous, lithe dragonfly perches on my knee
cocking his cobalt head in interested inquiry
a complicit and companionable passenger
preening his veined transparent wings,
sublime and unruffled,
along for the ride.
 
All profoundly picture perfect
and here I am without camera or paint
just idly going with the slow flow
literally immersed in the scene, undone
as layers of color in trees, grass, and sky
without humidity, melt into the water, fluid…
 
I’m soaking in brilliant, fluctuating pigment
permeated and drenched by the moving panorama
-sodden with reflection-
as I languidly gaze on this compounded glory
shoring up impressions to feast on
and digest in days to come.
 
 
by Polly Castor
August 6, 2013