5.25  [on the eve of an 18th birthday]

The flow trudging over the falls

has turned brown muddy gold. Days

of heavy rain in remission have

ribbed up the bottom places.

My son will turn a corner in

the morning, and bottom places

have risen within me as well.

I didn’t know it would go this fast,

I cried, seeing my classmates

start retirements. It feels the same

as this last one moves out.

The hard flow suddenly ebbs, water

through the sluices shuts down to

a channelled, domesticated straight.

canal. Water over the dam indeed.

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