The River Road

Come for a walk down the river road,
For though you're all a long time dead
The waters part to let us pass
The way we'd go on summer nights
In the times we were children
And thought we were lovers.
The river road led to the end of it all -
Stones and pale water, the lightship's bell
And distance we never looked into.
A long time gone
And the river road with it.
No margin to keep us in mind.
For afterlife, only beginning, beginning,
Wide, dark waters that grow in the telling,
Where the river road carries us now.

Sean O'Brien