Seated on the edge of the riverbank
Watching raindrops fall across the city light's reflection;
A living Monet of color and fluidity and the sutble refractions of life.
The bridge above me is humming with traffic,
The railyard to my left fills the cold night with the timeless bellowing of midnight trains,
Used syringes lay amongst the driftwood here.
A crudely painted ******* adorns the trail head,
Overgrown with brambles bushes and blackberry vines.
A solitary ****** cruises the shallow dregs of shore
On an endless quest to find her mate,
Painfully unawares of his fate,
Fallen victim to a poacher,
Some careless fool with a greedy and discontented heart.
The tents and tarps of Portland's homeless, the lost and forgotten, line these hillsides;
Their many dreams and hopes lie broken amidst the rubble of this everyday existence.
I sit here often, smoking and thinking, and watching the ever changing lights.
Every now and again I take a picture, gather a stone, or fall asleep to the sound of rain
And the smell of earth and leaves and rushing water.