Moonlight monologue

Now that the last of us eavesdroppers are gone, the little creek can speak freely, addressing nobody, confiding in the empty air.

It speaks of the brief lives of river stones, it speaks of the view from the clouds and the treetops. It speaks of all its meeting places with tributaries, of the council it keeps with the headwaters.

It speaks of its long project of dividing the inert, of reshaping the earth and articulating a landscape. It speaks of its other functions: freeing the cold that the bedrock withholds, preparing beds for the bones of animals so that they can sleep peacefully for another million years.

It speaks of its insatiable appetite for tree limbs and old boots and fishhooks, and it declares its appreciation to the humans for their generosity.

While I sleep in my bed, it carries on its discourse.