Miramichi Afternoon

The sloping shoulders of the river
tumble down rock on rock toward
the wind-riffled, slow-flowing water.
Alder and grass creep down the slope
but will be ripped out once again by
the ice-out floods of early spring.
The stones and haphazard boulders
are sun-baked into featureless gray,
their bright minerals shrouded from view.
Land-living things are more sparse here,
and those present are paused by the heat.
Out on the water, a dimple of a ring rises,
perhaps a salmon, more likely a trout,
a noiseless punctuation of somnolence.