The Flume – John Anderson

A careful jog across the bridge,

Pacing focused on every second beam,

Ears strained for rumble of oncoming trains.

Scramble down embankment, across shed roof,

Jump, clamber and slide down timbers,

Clothes being stripped all the while.

“Last one in is ‘It’!”

Bathing suits in hand we dove naked

Into the cool, dark waters,

Resurfacing behind the piers

To don our suits in safety,

Out of sight and reach of the hapless “It”

Who, from modesty or timidity,

Chose to change behind wooden pillars,

Out of public view.

A final splash signalled the chase begun.

Fingers and toes clawed at limestone walls

As bodies scaled piers, or silently submerged

To resurface undetected a pier or two removed,

While one or two stroked quickly across to the dam wall

From which to plot a strategic leaping dive

Over the outstretched arms of “It”

Who thought he had them cornered.

The quarry selected, the chase engaged;

From pier to pier, up wall and jump;

Up again and over, this time onto the bridge itself,

To take the ultimate plunge back to water,

Staying submerged long enough to disappear

Behind the third pier’s cover

And temporary reprieve.

It was our little piece of heaven,

Our “boys only” retreat from the ordinary and humdrum.

We lived our summers there in our world apart,

Begrudging breaks for lunch or dinner,

Time lost from days of chase and seek.

Late spring brought welcome diversion–

Floating clusters of jelly-like frogs’ eggs

Which we delighted in dive-bombing

From the top of the bridge,

And deliciously revolting green ooze handfulls,

With which we stalked one another in “paint ball” stealth,

Or laboriously carried, slipping and slimy,

As bombs to drop from high pier safety

And prove the earthy vulgarity

Of boyhood masculinity.

Who knows when the spell was broken?

Perhaps the shock of sober possibilities

When water drained for dam repair revealed steel rods,

Like spears, sprouting from the concrete floor,

Uncomfortably close to where the bravest of all

Would dive the twenty-one feet from bridge ledge to water.

Or was it the girls we eventually introduced to our male domain,

Never thinking until too late

How it would cramp our quick-change artistry?

Did the mill owner dismantle the turning wheel

That kept our watercourse alive?

Or maybe it was river controls that older minds installed

To divert the water for a worthier cause downstream

That rendered our pool stagnant

And its magic spent.

But returning visit finds no boyish paradise

No delighted laughter or gleaming bodies

Scaling piers and jumping from bridge’s edge.

Gone the magic and the spell of boy and river,

Replaced by stagnant pools and weedy neglect.

And a proper adult pub with river view,

Erasing all but my memory

Of that idyllic boyhood sanctuary.

And I am left to ponder how fifty years

Have cast a similar curse on me.

When did I last scamper across any bridge?

Or clamber down any timbers?

Or cast any garments to the wind and leap into life,

Naked with delight, and shouting,

“Last one in is ‘It’”?

– John Anderson, 2008