Unfinished Work III

Driftwood carried in the current,
spun on angry eddies,
diverges from a single path;
pieces catch upon the shore,
trapped by roots, hanging
skeletal from the embankment,
the last evidence of nobler origins.
Others soak up the river,
absorbing every nuance
of the waterway until,
dense and sodden from exposure,
the riverbed rushes up
to clutch in sedimentary
embrace the rotting log.
Yet others are plucked from
the river, snatched from the
oceanbound path by passing
children who think only of play,
hurling the burliest of beams
into tragic fortress piles
and swinging smaller sticks
in giddy facsimile of violence.