If the river wants to teach him song

If the river wants to teach him song,

she might swell as the winds swell,
to confound the boundaries of the land,
to fill him with the rolling rocks
of righteous fury, pain, and even madness.
Great river, temperamental goddess,
she is as loud as he is deaf,
and as boisterous as he is careless.

Or, she might retreat into her bed,
making room for tiny pinprick fish;
whom she relies on wind to move,
instruments for her liquid music,
sunshine staccato of temperamental trees,
as the great currents pluck her strings,
all conspiring to swirl her forward
into the great expanse of his heart.