From Little River to Ocean Dreamer
Dear Nixie, I wondered if you might deliver a letter to one who has passed over to a new existence. I wrote it some years ago to make sense of loss. I’ve never shown it to anyone before. I tried to write a new one in the here and now but I kept getting all of it wrong so here’s one from 1994. Could you send it along the river of time by chance? Here it is….. Dear Big River, Today I read a poem right out loud in your honour. It’s one of my favourites of all time. I think it’s a beautiful poem: “I’ve known rivers I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins. My soul has grown deep like the rivers . I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young. I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep. I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it. I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln Went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset.