The Chattahoochee Riverwalk

Lyrics

You are the long wooden spine.
The seam between the mown grass of Riverside Park and the Chattahoochee's slow brown muscle.

Six a.m. mist.
My shoes make a hollow sound on your cedar planks, still dark with dew.
I follow your line, just above the mud bank.
You smell of wet wood and deep earth.
You bend where the river bends.
A patient answer to the water's oldest question.

And this is the city's southern hem.
The last quiet word before the water speaks.
Where the trout fishermen lean on your rails,
and the spring shad run silver under our feet.
The Riverwalk.
The long, slow breath.

The kayak stand is still chained shut.
The paddles wait in their racks.
Soon the families will come, pushing strollers, pointing.
A man I've never met, but see every Tuesday, casts his line from the second bend.
We nod.
We don't need to speak.
We're just listening to the river breathe against your pilings.

And this is the city's southern hem.
The last quiet word before the water speaks.
Where the trout fishermen lean on your rails,
and the spring shad run silver under our feet.
The Riverwalk.
The long, slow breath.

Across the water, there.
In that tall pine.
A tangle of sticks bigger than a man.
The eagles have been back since the 1990s, they say.
Watching us watch them.
A quiet treaty signed across the current.
Your planks are the best place to see it.
The best place to stand still and just see.

The water laps, laps, laps.
I'll walk you to the end and back.
My footsteps marking time.
The city's edge.
The river's friend.