Loire

To endear me to you
You need say nothing
To make me captive to
Your Muddy Banks
Wet with Autumn's touch

To see beyond the grey
Towers, laden with
Tile, brick and mortar
Is a Song unto itself
That echoes over the river

Some days, when the
Sky is a marble slab
The rain harasses me
Every drop
A demoralizing word

But when my toes taste
Water-smoothed pebbles
Grass and fallen leaves
Greet my heels in passing
The marble cracks

Mountains of it fall
From the sky, embodying
All Ugliness, Tearing the
Earth, the Trees, the Water
Asunder

But whilst I walk
The wind parts my
Hair and it flies
Floating on the peace
Of your solemn, silent beauty

And death is a sigh
Life is a breath
When the earth beneath my feet sinks
Into your water