The woods aren’t very deep, but you can
get past where the sound of traffic
reaches, and all you hear is the melody
water makes dropping around rocks,
a complex composition, constantly
changing, modulating, carrying your mind
like a leaf along the surface unless you
make the choice to stay where you stand,
by the side of the stream, and watch
how the water flows around the rocks,
sliding along the jagged blades of ice
that cling to the banks, the few broken
branches that hang into the stream, limp
and swaying with the current. When I
kneel and let the water course around
my hand, the cold shoots the length
of my arm, and even my teeth ache from
the violent chill. I let it stay a minute
more in the water, two, and feel the way
the water moves, courses, the steady
irregularity of current, and I feel
the way the water moves in me—all
blood, muscle, everything water, everything
flowing, flowing—constant motion
while the mind sits still and sings
the song of the water, soft then loud,
soft, then lift my hand from the stream,
shake it dry, and take the long way home.
Allen Hoey has published two novels and five collections of poems, most recently Country Music (2008). In 2009 he will publish a new collection of poems and a mystery. He teaches at Bucks County Community College and directs the Bucks County Poet Laureate Program.