Expression: Both Deep and Wide

[Reflection on Canoeist Camp]

A husky wind brusquely hissed brushing the rivercraft shoreward. I impale the water, scraping desperately to regain the little control I had. A single fallen ivory shaft reaching like a skeletal finger from the bank. I needed to straighten our little craft or play tag with the large wooden finger blocking our thoroughfare. “I need your help, Genny,” I begged. Our combined efforts demonstrated the vast difference between our power and the power of the elements. The river dismissed our efforts with disdainful waves. Desperation. I beat desperately at the dingy aquarion serpent, but am helpless in its tumbling coils. Change of plans. Instead of fighting the coils, I submit to the current. I back-paddle turning ahead the naval clock from bow at 8:00 to 2:00. We spun languidly away from the rigid finger.

Blue Eyes
. . . Ice blue pools, both cold and vulnerable, blink like clouds veiling a morning sky. A sky stark and strong with no gentleness . . .

Brown Eyes
. . . Intensity welling out of large chocolate orbs, drown those that meet them in palpable shock. They are articulate and expressive and yet frightened. Conveying an almost bestial terror; the prison of an isolated soul . . .

A forceful ethereal hand pushed the bobbling canoe towards the long groping fingers of a Russian olive. The tame teal leaves do not suggest the vicious bards that lurk beneath them. My heart sank as I my paddle found no purchase in the tumbling liquid. Genny, had not been having a fun time. Despite the depth of my desire to protect her, I was powerless. It was perhaps the slowest collision I have ever experienced. Genny put up a defensive hand with all the drama and terror of an extra in a horror flick; the kind that find an especially gory end. But the tree attacked her with surprising patience, leaving a horrible splinter in her hand. A wall of thorns was headed my way. I attempted matrix style evasion, while struggling not to fall out the back of the canoe. But arching in the middle of the prickly tangle the canoe came to a stop. "Paddle, Genny, Paddle," I cried in earnest from the midst of the thorns. "I lost my paddle," Genny related in a paniced tone. With a sigh I began to contort writhing like a snake inside the Russian olive. The paddle hit with timid strokes as I attempted to pull away from my pokey prison . . .