I’ll step over the stream

but I’d rather step in: 

kick my shoes off,

peel my socks off,

dip one toe in to start.

And if it’s cold, all the better

for when I slip one whole foot in

and then the other,

let the small pebbles tickle my sole

and jagged rocks nip my heel,

watch the blue veins of my feet

dance under ripples and rolls 

of the current, now

disturbed by ankle one and ankle two.

I take my time in streams

and in return, streams take time with me.

I might stand as still as I can

and wait for the minnows to accept me

as the stream itself and say to me

you are our home now:

you are the stream.

                                                               after Peter Sirr

Eileen Ellis