montana girl speaks of water

photo by Nadine Hergenrider

The Montana Girl Speaks of Water
                        after Langston Hughes

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
Eddies and bays abound

in my retreat to the mists
of the Missouri River falls, climbing

rock cliffs, toeing dirt, sliding
down the banks of graveyards

to a wide lazy
shoreline, retracing steps

once laid down with such skip,
such snap little girls had back then, still

wading in shallow water
with rolled cuffs and muddy elbows,

dreaming all the world was one
cool, shin-high ripple.

                 **

This poem was originally published in Babel Fruit. Click Here.