The Lion in the Aqueduct

Rushing by, washing away, deepening down, closing off,
Each droplet flowing to the ocean.
The walls crumble to sand; the sand gets carried away
Even as we do.

As we bring our boundaries down, we scrape too at the floor:
Walls once sand are sand no more -
Digging, digging, we find walls of sandstone.
We build the aqueducts that will form our world.

Water only rushes where water flows,
Boats can only navigate where they run not aground.
They call us the water bearers, but the water bears us.
They say, fear not the apotheosis of the ocean,
For even as clouds bear droplets to mountaintops,
Our river is fueled by those who lose themselves in the only dance.

Never, roars the Lion.
River shortens, river widens, and all is lost in the morass.
The soup of tides spreads each day as the river carries away its bounds.
Tear down that wall, it was said, so instead we live in a trench.

It is inevitable that rivers wear at their banks,
That we avert from leaning over the edge of canyons,
That mountain climbers are seen as just a little bit crazy.

Just as it is inevitable that we yearn again for the idyllic.
Would we recognize it if we saw it?
Are our eyes sealed with the sand we've scraped away?

Some who don a mane bleat that the end is near,
That we will be the victims of population control,
Engineered pandemics, sinking continents, solar flares, meteorites.

But there is no emancipation, only waiting.
The chreode becomes so stable it collapses.
Nothing escapes, not even light, all trajectories point home.
As above, so below.

But no matter how we try, we can never drown the Lion;
The Lion grows gills and will sting those who would try.
The tamer who lets his guard down is maimed,
And tension is the key to instability.

We must trust in inevitability.

Copyright J.K. Strain, 2013.