The River Too Deep To Pray Poem by Robert Rorabeck

I am moving now,
Floating past my old captain on
The rocks,
Still calling out the depths
Even though his ship is sunk.

I am invested now even though
The current is too wide and deep
For me to make it to the safety
Of either riverbank;

And the sun is going down,
Releasing a purse of crocodiles,
As I imagine how her legs are lying down
Like an archway of a national moment
Taking a breather from the flash-bulb tourism,
From all the pretty shirts,
The petty smiles; she dims her torch,
And yet silently, black-jetted,
She runs on for many miles;

And I am steeped in her,
And I will continue to do my good works in
Her until I drown, until the little foal is too weak
To nurse and thus lies down, and all the lights
Bleed into night as she does his thing,
But the blessed river is too wide and deep
To pray for blessed rain.