The River

Rippling through
O slime and clothes of came —
A sound like layered fabric bells,
Knuckles deep through silk, carved beneath
A new road where the weather pours.

With every breath by edge and plain,
An orchestra of nymphs unsteep,
Upon my sight comes rides and rings,
The silence quenched, before the wilds.

Let the trees swirl gently over thoughts;
What curvatures run truly down,
For this river knows the seam;
The shadow depth beneath the night —
New cast, new tides awaken
Whisper low beyond Porcupine —
May it all reveal the grace!

Let count the retched boats that turn —
The flow remembers this path still
And the river never ceases:
A quiet, gentle running –
And this is how I hold the world,
Inside these gentle waves.

• Louis MacNeice