We went down the river.
With each step we took the waters grew colder.
I had difficulty breathing,
I lost all sense of touch.
Lost my camera and my sunglasses too.
I shielded my eyes against the glare off the surface.
One by one my companions
turned back.
They called they would wait for me in the clearing
where we’d parked the car, and prepare the picnic.
Their voices echoed in the gorge.
I went on alone, knowing I would not see them again.
Above me the sides
of the cliff rose steeply.
Trees hung horizontally from the rock-face.
I glimpsed figures on the highest points,
a flash of binoculars through the bronze-tipped leaves.
A dog barked somewhere nearby on the shore.
I was crossing into no-man’s-land, the forbidden regions.
The stones that stared up at me from the riverbed
were the featureless stony faces of the dead.
Then I lost my footing,
the bottom fell away,
and I was forced to swim through the freezing waters,
as my lungs burned and my chest ached,
breasting the current, seeking the source.
At last I stumbled
out through the shallows,
where my feet welcomed the hard gravel
and a momentary heat steamed off my shoulders.
There were strings of sunlight woven in the bushes,
and a distant music, and for a moment I forgot myself,
before
I bowed and entered the cave.