Black River 

"North and south of my house flow spring waters.
Every day only gulls come to visit me."
– Du Fu, from "Guests Arrival..."









To the north the black river lays
steady as a dream, a long mirror.
Inside it the bough of a gnarled oak,
the vague shimmer of a long line
of wild geese passing slow waves
my way in the wrong direction.
There had been days of visitors.
When the white of ground frost
was a broad canvas of sunlight.
Your oars split the water like wings.
Two bay eagles circled in tandem
to music you could not hear but see.