I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name

there's a small river flowing
by my place of work in an old mill town
where the mills that once choked
the river are no longer industrious and
there isn't much for people there now
but the river is alive again

every day I walk by and stand for a minute
on the high bank
to try to see beneath the surface
of the brown water

today I watched a snapping turtle hunting
yesterday, a crayfish scuttling from my sudden presence,
and before that a swimming muskrat,
black birds and a squirrel at play,
small darting fish.

life is so much more than me
more than just
us.