I am a River

“I am a river,”
you say to me 
and gleefully 
run off to find
the ridges that 
will bolster you 
when the time 
comes to submit 
to Tethys and 
become your 
winding, watery, 
infinite self. 

Now it is my turn to claim my existence.
I am not like you; the river does not embody me. 
Maybe I’m destined to become a lake, or a pond. 
I feel that I am the water that holds the spotted 
salamanders and gives life to dragonflies and tadpoles. 
There are sturdy rocks and pebbles that line my shores, 
and the cattails choose to make their home alongside my 
waters. I am a Naiad, but a Limnad in that. I am not 
a river; I am the cool depths of a deep lake. I am the water 
that bursts with life.