Like a Long River Running – a poem by Laura Denny

Like a Long River Running

It breathes you in and sings you out
as it carries you to your wilderness 
where you have to go to find yourself
finally on your knees 

You gleaned its grace in your weakness 
and found the deep reservoir of kindness 
where we all recognize each other 
when brought to our depth.

It showed you how to rise 
again like morning dew, 
to disappear then gather 
to find your course again.

It beats the drum of your dreaming
and sounds the bell of your being
while you tumble and fall
and continue to carry on

Through the narrow gorge of sorrow
through the golden fields of delight
to the mouth of all that ends
and all that begins again.

Laura Denny has lived in the Santa Cruz Mountains for many years. She is retired from thirty years of teaching kindergarten. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Sunlight Press, Remington Review and Academy of the Heart And Mind.