Stick

“Bend like water; like water bite.”
Advice. But what am I?
A stick tossed on the current. I
can’t bend, can’t bite, can’t
mark my way.

I’ve had my green leaves and my bloom.
Now dry, I sense the pull
of oceans I can’t navigate,
nor can I choose one threaded flow
among the rocks, muds, effluent,

but like a stick a child has thrown
into a river, I bob and turn—
thrown, and thrown away.

M. Travis Lane

M. Travis Lane's most recent book of poetry is Keeping Count. She lives in Fredericton, New Brunswick.

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