Sauvie’s Island

A piece of a sand dollar in the dark gray riverbed, embedded in pebbles hewn as fine as black pepper. Here on the banks of the Columbia, an hour’s drive from the ocean, the water feels like its own gentle coastline, quiet ripples and a steep drop-off, and seagulls that fluff their feathers in the sand. Up, high above, higher than seems possible, a single turkey vulture glides westward. Against the clouds it is a dark, silent arrow, another world from these screaming children, who splash into the river despite the cool wind, and run with sand kicking up behind them in black torments. I search for the stillness behind it all. The row of green cottonwoods that mark the beginning of Washington. The osprey on its power line nest. The bend in the river, the blue hills, where clouds pull into distant rain.