the current

THE CURRENT

-W.S. Merwin

 

For a long time some of us

lie in the marshes like dark coats

forgetting that we are water

 

dust gathers all day on our closed lids

weeds grow up through us

 

but the eels keep trying to tell us

writing over and over in our mind

our heavenly names

 

and through us a thin cold current

never sleeps

 

its glassy feet move on until they find stones

 

then cloud fish call to it again

your heart is safe with us

 

bright fish flock to it again touch it

with their mouths say yes

have vanished

 

yes and black flukes wave to it

from the Lethe of the whales

 

*

this poem resonated with me today, a truly fall-like and watery day in mcminnville. i read it while eating creamy oatmeal with maple syrup and drinking an americano. leaves were falling outside the window. the colors seem to be slower to arrive this year (this picture is from last fall), but the leaves are always pretty when they spiral down to the street.

(also, “Lethe,” which i had to look up, means “oblivion, or forgetfulness” and is related to the greek work for truth. “Lethe” was one of the five rivers in the greek mythical underworld, the most famous of which is the Styx.)