I would never say that Lillie-Mae

Was what you might describe as a raving beauty.

Yet, she did have something very special

Because almost everybody was a friend of hers.

I suppose I most likely loved her, but

Only in the same way that I loved my sister.

Actually, she was a sort of sister.

She was one of the very few girls I talked to.

The last time I ever actually saw her

Was going up along side Steve and Thomas’s alley.

We called it that, but I don’t think

It was actually officially named so.

Unfortunately, she was nursing a broken heart.

She had fallen in love with a married man

Not knowing he was married until

He dropped her like she might be poison.

She was crying very softly as I neared.

So, I offered my shoulder and arm

On which she could unburden her battered heart,

Breaking out in heart-rendering sobs as I held her.

Some five minutes later, we started to walk

And to talk until she was finally in control.

I gave her a kiss and a big, tight hug and left.

Shortly after, she left for Wisconsin where

She became an old maid schoolteacher.

But she became such a top notch one,

That many of her children never forgot her.

She is gone now, yet I still remember her.

I am again in that river valley

If only in my spirit soul.

The call of the river is so irresistible

I have felt it in my bones all of my life.

The river seems to flow through my very soul.

Here, feel the smooth silkiness of its flow.

 

Deep pools, shallow draws and swift running ways

Reflecting a glorious sky, moon and stars.

All of its hillside borders covered with leaves.

 

Hidden from all but my fellow river lovers

Are glorious flowers and tasty plants to eat.

Blueberry, bleeding hearts, violets, apple blossoms and

May flowers, dandelions, Indian pinks, daffodils.

So many flowers, I can’t name them all, but there

In deeply hidden glens, grow spearmint and peppermint.

I scent the air as the leaves are crushed.

 

Take me back, oh, my soul to that river course.

Let me once again regain the sheer ecstasy

Of a youth, long since lost in utter foolishness.

Once more, let me stand on the shores and

Smell the heaven-sent perfume of my river way.

 

Nightfall seemed to accentuate the spell of music–

The evening train going somewhere west at dusk

Sounded its whistle with such a lonesome wail

It seemed to beckon me to go along to faraway places.

Downstream, the Bessemer furnace lit up the skies

In a fiery orange-red flame every hour

As it cleared its throat with a storm of air.

And when the Dixie Belle played its calliope,

The music bounded from hilltop to hilltop

With such glorious musical tones

It made me feel transported to distant cities.

 

And nothing could be better than a moonlit swim,

Drifting with the slow-moving river current,

And the love spoken back and forth in boats

Oared by star-smitten young lovers being close.

 

That’s all so far away now I can only

Picture it in my restless dreams after midnight.