A river lives in many moods.
Serenely flowing, it paints a peaceful oil
Of powerful tranquility.
Its strength is hidden within its flow
And life is sustained within its course.
When dancing, happily over riffles, rocks and shoals
It sings songs of enthusiastic happiness.
Like first love it excites, then wanes.
The dancing songs become mundane.
When roaring through gorges, ledges, and falls
It screams of enthusiastic abandon.
Senses are heightened and anxiously purified
Life and death are one, and become alive.
A river, its liquid moods, wet the flow of life.
Peacefully flowing, with strength in tranquility
A place where most of us are.
A happy riffle, an occasional shoal
Waters a normal life.
But a few, a very few, once in a while,
Love the gorges, ledges and falls
And crave the roaring, screaming life and death
To make everything else worthwhile.
-FRITZ CRYTZER