River run

My writing group did the exercise today in Ursula Le Guin’s book Steering the Craft: Exercises and Discussions on Story Writing for the Lone Navigator or the Mutinous Crew from chapter four which involves conscious repetition of words. We were stuck until Felicity suggested a river would be a good place to start and Priscilla suggested that an incantation would be a good mode. And when I found myself by my river it began to lift its legs and leave its bed…

River flow. River run. Overflow. Disaster follows. Swirling round the ankles of people, tables, chairs. River runs free, breaks banks, bursts bounds, loosens mud, washes grasses, works a way through houses, villages, roads. Runs where no river should go. Run River run! Down the highway to the city, swirl, unfurl your power of water, whip cars up and round to face the wrong way, slash the buildings with filth as you pass, running, flowing, swirling, unfurling. On and on past the city. On and on through the land. Wider and wider. Deeper and deeper. Fuller and fuller. Wider and wider. Flatter and flatter. Thinner and thinner. Until you run out. Ooze, splurt and halt. Look back River, at the damage, destruction and disaster. Look back River, in your wake dishevelment and dispacement. River run out of power. River run out of care. River run out, out. River bed empty and dry. River out of place. River a river no more.