by Floyd Skloot

In time the fork my life took
as illness changed its course
will wander to the main stream
and there below the long waterfalls
and cataracts I will begin to rush
to the place I was going from the start.
I imagine looking back to see
the silted mass where a huge bend
holds sunlight in a net of evergreen
and the sky unable to bear its own
violet brilliance a moment longer.
Out of shadows where the channel
crumbles comes the raucous sound
a great blue heron makes when startled.
Scent of peppermint rides breezes
from the valley and I catch hints
of a current beneath the surface
just as darkness unfurls.
There I imagine what was lost
coming together with what was gained

Floyd Skloot’s memoir In the Shadow of Memory won the 2004 PEN USA Literary Award, the Independent Publishers Book Award, and the Oregon Book Award, and was a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Discover Award and the PEN Award for the Art of the Essay. Its sequel, A World of Light, was a NY Times Book Review Editors Choice Selection and is due out in paperback in fall 2008. His six collections of poetry include The End of Dreams (LSU Press, 2006), a finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize; Approximately Paradise (Tupelo Press, 2005), winner of the Pacific NW Booksellers Association Book Award; and the forthcoming Selected Poems: 1970-2005 (Tupelo Press, 2008) and The Snow’s Music (LSU Press, 2008). He is also the author of four novels, most recently Patient 002 (Rager, 2007). Skloot’s awards include two Pushcart Prizes and the inclusion of his work in The Best American Essays 1993 and 2000, The Best American Science Writing 2000 and 2003, The Best Spiritual Writing 2001. He lives in Portland, OR. view his website