Heart

I saw this one floating
a long time before I recognized it.
It resembled driftwood
long, spiny, and torturously curled
towards the center of the river
On that shoal to the left, the one with the big rock
where I had never seen one before.

That might have been part of it, too,
come to think of it.
Because I just didn't expect to see it there,
in the middle of things, and interfering with all of them
by resting along that shallow spot.

I grabbed my hook and prepared to draw it to the bank
This compelling piece of driftwood
Which, I idly thought while pulling, would look nice
Cleaned up, denuded of seaweed and the relentless razor clams

Which had attached themselves with
biology's reckless determination,
and placed in my garden, possibly where I had taken to
meditating of late, where the new Buddha sat with me.

This was my place, I thought, my vein, my water.

And I couldn't allow it to be disturbed by something like this
piece of driftwood, coral-white and large enough to catch

all the debris of a crazy-wet spring, and hold it
deep within its convoluted prongs.

And so I dragged it in and
recognized you.