Water Under the Bridge

Water under the bridge:
The dead and gone;
Shades of meaning
No longer important.

First there was water
From rain or snowmelt,
Running underground,
Resurfacing, a spring
Out of bare rock.

Water under the bridge
Slipped by unnoticed
Its passing forgotten
Every swirling eddy
Indistinguishable from the last.

In a time before bridges
Rivers ran clear
From wellspring to sea;
Only flowing mattered.

Piers and buttresses
On opposite banks
Brought an end
To separation.

Water crossings,
Consequences
Of travel and traffic,
Of people moving;

The coming of roads,
Progression, the onward journey,
What flooded beneath,
An invisible torrent of moments.

Voyage. Direction.
Destination. Purpose.
Bridges over trouble.
Perpetual motion.

Loss.  Disagreement
Contention. Swept away.
Water under bridges
Of our becoming.

© BH, 2016

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I’ve had water under the bridge moments, but the water keeps on coming. Once rivers cut through, divided and went on free flowing. Then we bridged the gaps, asserted land’s dominance.

Whatever rivers represented, continuity perhaps, has been trumped by bridges and the flow of humans and their lives over them. Rivers run as they always have, of course. Now they carry everything we can’t quite grasp. Perhaps we never even tried.