Lower Mckenzie Poem by Michael McGriff

Like the blue elephants
we watched and never understood
under instant patchwork tents next to the highway
the river makes a slow gray drop
to its knees. The flood plains breathe,
surrounded by miles of barbed wire again.
I know a place where the winds
from those waters smother ferns in coils
of dust. I know where we can work our green lines
up and down a piano roll of trout.
It's over there, past the rust-gutted steam donkey
and the dry creek beds pooling up with yellowjackets.