Kaweah River

Stacy Link

Icy snow-melt roaring down from the high Sierras.
It’s crystal clear and in Summer it slows.
We wade in wearing cut-offs and tennies,
Trying to stay upright on the river rock bed, it seems cold only for a moment.
The water is so full of minerals you can smell it and taste it, you can’t stop.
Cupping mouthful after mouthful as it flows by undeterred.
Inside the bridge on the left the swallows leave their daub-nests.
Cars and people cross over to our road and house.
The backyard runs down to the river.
It’s full of boulders and huge trees sometimes covered over
When the river rises real high in Spring.
On the other side Caroline the donkey lives with the neighbors
She brays at us every morning when we call to her and seems happy.
Below the big boulder on that side a small river bank beach
And a pooling eddy of the river sit and wait. But
The river is just wide enough and rough enough that we don’t go,
Even in Summer. The farthest we’ll go is under the bridge
Where we can get a closer look at the Swallow’s nests.
They say Kaweah means Raven’s-cry. We are down in the foothills
And it gets hot and snows only a little.