End of the Summer

[bruorton]

for Lizzie, who is leaving the country

Eruptions in Tonga bring us a rainy season,
we complain about the weather, and
the rivers threaten to overflow. You cannot
step into the same river twice, Heraclitus
opined; neither the river nor you can ever
be the same. There was a joke my father,
a retired philosophy prof, loved to repeat:
Heraclitus’ wife saying “Don’t be an ass—
of course you can, if you just walk downstream.”

Walking through this summer has felt
to me like a favorite childhood book you
never wanted to end, wishing you could
follow the characters on beyond the last
page into that other world, the one
where they go on just living happily
after all adventures are over, doing
the dishes and going about their days.

We reread our favorite books, but give
Heraclitus his due: it’s never quite the
same. We’re always a little older. We know
how it ends. That it ends. We pick up
on things we missed before. But I
suppose that means the book itself
is always new too, in a way.

I don’t mean to be writing a book
myself, here. I just went looking
for a way to say how much I’ll
miss you, how much it has
been raining inside me. The
way it threatens to overflow.

Not to worry. I do trust we’ll get to
pick up this book again at some
point. One day the page will turn
and there we’ll be, our own little Ratty
and Mole, messing about in boats.

We’ll be different, too; older, maybe
wiser. More aware of endings. I do
realize how much of the last few years
neither of us wants to repeat.

But I dare to say we built ourselves
a little haven, here amid the depression
and the heartbreak. A companionable joy.

Of any gift I could give, that’s the one I’m
sending with you. The one I’ll carry safe.

I’ll see you downstream. It’ll all be new.