Watershed
Really just a stream
What we called simply
“Creek” (in accent: “crick”)
Shallow rills for summer wading
Cold flanks of limestone spring
We ragged group of nymphs
Sisters of my youth
Bolted gaily, daily
Down the hills, pooled
Ourselves beside the bank
We harried crawdads from their dens
Gave silver minnows fairy names
We saw ourselves in damselflies
Molting toward our adult wings
While sustained by infant gills
What snakes we found in Eden
We kept all summer in our rooms
Their flicking tongues, feather light
Spoke nothing of temptation
We loosed them in the fall
As time loosed us one season
To gain the winnowed air
We gleamed in bright emergence
Damp jewels ferried on a breeze
Into brilliant scattered flight
Published in The Journal of Liberal Arts and Education Winter 2010
Rae Spencer 
Illustration excellently done too!
Thank you! 🙂
Love the language that sets the scene so naturally and yet magically too.
Especially love:
‘We saw ourselves in damselflies
Molting toward our adult wings
While sustained by infant gills’
Lovely and engaging to read, Rae!
Thank you! This poem is very close to my heart, and I’m delighted that you enjoyed it!
BEAUTIFUL! POEM AS PICTURE/PICTURE AS POEM!
Thank you!