THE RIVER FLOWS INTO THE SEA

“What if…?”

When I was a young child, I often spent summers in the Adirondack Mountains, in upper New York State. They are glorious mountains with spectacular peaks and valleys, views of forever, giant pine trees and an abundance of wildlife.

On one of my excursions up the mountain, I noticed a tiny trickle of water dribbling down the side of a rock formation. Where, I wondered, was the water coming from. I asked my dad and he said, that’s snow that fell in the winter, melted in the spring and was now on its way to a stream, lower down the mountainside. “And where does the stream go?” I asked. The stream, my father told me, flows into a river and the river flows into the sea.

Remember now, even at that young age, I was a budding poet and so the concept of that snowflake falling in the winter, melting in the spring, dribbling down the side of a steep cliff, becoming a stream, that flowed into a river that then, flowed into the sea, delighted me. A journey from the sky to the sea – a journey from the peak of a mountain to the ocean.

I had, of course, spent many summer days at the beach; toes digging into the wet sand, the water gently teasing my legs. I loved the beach. I loved the sea. I loved mountains too but not quite as much as I loved the seashore. And, I realized, I never thought they were connected in any way.

The journey of a snowflake became for me, many years later, a metaphorical image that lay buried in my mind. And today, it resurrected itself. As I look around me, listening to the unbearable noise of bloodied headlines, shattered lives, broken dreams, I often find myself crying – just because I can. Just because I must. It is a response to a sadness that I cannot navigate. A sadness that speaks of lives lost, the precious gift of time, wasted. That is the world we live in – that is our journey. But what if…

…what if, we could emulate that snowflake? What if we could melt into a trickle down the days of our lives, along with every other snowflake that fell? What if we could merge into that stream, together? And together, become part of the river that would take us, gloriously, into the vastness, the immense unity, of the sea? What if…

…we lived our lives flowing together towards shared dreams, hopes, aspirations, possibilities? What if the minuteness of our single droplet became the vastness of a single entity? What if, as with the endless ebb and flow of the sea, we – all humanity – moved in harmony with one another?

We could save our planet. We could save one another. We could grow in wisdom and kindness, and we could wake to joy, not sadness, life not death. We could embrace the gift of nature, the endless possibilities that become apparent when an almost impossible task for one is tackled easily by many. We could, metaphorically speaking, move mountains.

The child in me remembers and the memory is one of beauty and joy and a sense of wonder. A single snowflake into a stream, a stream into a river that flows, irrevocably into the sea…



What if…?
…we woke from dreams
to dreams
to light to flowers
blooming in the late day sun moonlight
melting everything to gold what if
the waters flowed both free and clean
crops grew and nature thrived

we told
the truth instead of lies
reached across the aisles of all
our differences
what if we treasured kindness
dispensing it like rainfall on
a parched dry land what if
we measured one another not
by wealth acquired by
a gluttony of greed
but rather how we bowed
to one another’s need believing
each path leads
towards who
we need to be welcoming

civility
defining us
aligning us

what if…
we fall
we fail

what if…
mankind defeats
and is defeated by
our inability to be

we
instead of
I…

Susan A. Katz (All rights reserved)

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