So remind me: 
how did the companionable silence 
flow between us? Describe,
if you can, the way the current 
burnished the sharp rocks, settled 
the roiling sediment 
onto the stream bed. That gentleness 
escapes me.
So many things written down
never happened, so many tides never turned 
to wash away words 
scratched in sand
and memory.
 

Jeannie Prinsen lives with her husband, daughter, and son in Kingston, Ontario, where she teaches an online course in essay writing at Queen’s University. Her writing has appeared in Reckon Review, Relief, Juniper Poetry, and elsewhere.