Salmon Leap (Poetry)

It’s such a long way back
to where life’s river ran,
brilliant at its source
and youth, quick-silvered, swam

so eager for the sea,
its salty, worldly ways;
cross currents tugged and charmed
slow-drifting shoals of days

until a changing tide
brought winds that bore a trace
of something half-recalled —
a scent, a sound, a place

so sharp that memories
chase clear across the foam,
instinctive in their quest
to find the lost route home.

The old, nostalgic heart
grows restless in its dreams,
leaping like a fish
that journeys back upstream.