Fremantle, April 2015
Alone on the bridge, near the northern end, I paused.
Down below on the creamy riverbed
someone had arranged brown boulders
to make a huge word:
LOVE. And above the E
a shoal of mullet
turned
in a silver spiral.
Cars surged behind me.
Bikes whizzed by.
The fish swam smoothly,
going east, south, west,
north, centre;
going hills, lakes, sea,
suburbs, sky.
I forced my eyes to follow
one. It flowed around the curve
and among its neighbours, fitting
its path, in a little, out a little,
never colliding.
The small galaxy revolved, turning and turning
and turning above the E. Then the flashes began.
A fish-twitch. A shimmy. Another, another,
another, flicked silver glances
back at the sun. The trance broke
but the pattern held. Slowly, the whorl
moved
over the V, then across the O
and toward the main current,
toward the sea.
I watched it go
until the huge word
was clear. Then
I too, all my cells,
moved off.