When I was young,

I would often seek

to swim in the Daniels Creek,

with nothing enjoyed more

then to catch trout for dinner

or ferrying-shaped tree limbs, stout and en route

to splash the cares of heat from the workday.

Wholly inviting it was to early escape

from the chore of putting in the hay.

It was such a treat of earned relief

to fall, bare feet first,

through the hot mire,

sweeping below the summer-cold, water ripple

to the refreshing short-timed hold of renewal.

Generous family and neighborly,

fun-loving friends of place and spirit,

were inclined to spend time with kids

of all relations and mixed degrees of kin

who were full of the need

for endless adventures,

and prone to flip their lids.

Names on family pictures are fading,

like my memories,

since I more than waded in that fine creek,

and I think I would feel more complete,

and life might rarely ever feel tepid or bleak,

if I spent more time immersed in those healing waters.