The River

by Maureen Teresa McCarthy

She’s gone now

Left, closed the door

Gently, but firmly

And it’s not as though

It was sudden or strange

Her leaving.

No, she’d let me know

Her time was coming

All those months

On the full moon

Rivers of deep rich red

Fading

The river ran dry.

But

The stream bed is beautiful.

The bones

Show clearly

And I can see the way

To the source.

* * * * *

Maureen Teresa McCarthy is a central New York native who moved to California, graduated from SF State and worked in publishing. She traveled in Europe and Mexico for two years, returned to the Finger Lakes, completed her MA at Syracuse. She taught Composition at various community colleges, raised two sons. She has published essays with Fairview and University of Michigan Press, has completed a civil war novel, and has always written poetry. Her poems have appeared in Comstock Review, Months to Years, Penwomen, and other journals.