Already the river is lighter in color,
less brown, less turbid, more
translucent. Just yesterday
the currents were thick with mud
and logs, needles and sticks
and bits of once-living debris.
Now that the furious flood has lost
its force, the gravel and sand
have begun their settling.
Whatever was floating now rests
on the banks and all that is left
suspended in the water
is what is most fine.
Soon, even that will sink
and the water will be clear again.
I, too, have felt the gift of slowing,
how it invites a sedimentation
of all I try to carry—the silt of my stories,
the muck of the world.
Like a river, the more calm I am,
the more clear I can become.
No magic, just a matter of physics.
How natural it is, the clearing.