I’m still standing in the river, singing. Birds fly from my fingers. The wind blooms flowers in my hair, my arms and hands, and carries the perfumed petals away into the deep wood. Birds rise from the canopy and descend. The forest is teaming with unseen life.

The river brings me a baby, swaddled in a reed basket, bobbing on the current. I lift the baby in my arms, cradling him to me, cooing and singing and rocking him. I want to rock him forever, but he grows quick quick into a lithe young man who stands beside me, raises his arms and laughs. Then quick quick he crosses the river and runs into the wood. I lose sight of him but know that he is busy, running here and there collecting and finding and rejoicing.

By evening he is home again with me. He has brought dinner which he cooks over a fire. We eat and sit together watching the stars come into the gathering dark, sharing quiet, sharing content.

“Don’t worry Mama,” he says. “I’ll look after you.”

He is my provider.

OOO