The rowing boat on the still lake

The lake is so still tonight that it holds the whole sky. Every star is there twice, once above you and once below, and the little wooden rowing boat floats in the middle of it all as if it were drifting through the night itself.

You are sitting in the boat with the oars resting across your knees. You rowed out a while ago, slowly, just far enough that the shore became a soft dark line of trees. Now you have stopped rowing. There is nowhere else to go. The boat does not need to go anywhere.

The wood of the oars is smooth and worn, warm from your hands. Water drips from the blades, one drop and then another, each falling into the lake with a tiny sound and sending out a ring of ripples that spreads and spreads and fades away. You watch the rings widen until you cannot see them any more.

The air smells of cool water and pine needles and the faint green scent of reeds. Somewhere near the shore, a frog makes a low, contented sound, and then another answers, and then they are both quiet again. An owl calls once from the far woods, soft and round, like someone blowing gently across the top of a bottle.

You lift the oars into the boat and lay them down along the sides. The boat rocks a little as you move, and then settles. You can feel it settling, the slow rise and fall growing smaller and smaller, until the lake is still again and so are you.

There is a folded blanket in the bottom of the boat, and a small cushion. You arrange them and lie back, and the wooden ribs of the boat curve around you, holding you, the way cupped hands hold water. Above you, the sky is deep and clear and scattered with stars. You can see the pale band of the galaxy stretched across it like a soft scarf.

The boat turns, very slowly, on the still water. You cannot feel it turning, but the stars wheel gently above you, and the shape of the trees moves from one side to the other. It is like being turned in someone’s arms.

The water makes small sounds against the hull. A soft lap. A tiny knock. A whisper. It is the sound of the lake breathing. You find yourself breathing with it. In, and the boat lifts a little. Out, and it sinks back down.

All the things of the day are on the shore. They are waiting there, patient and small, and they will still be there in the morning. You do not need to carry any of them out here. The boat is light. You are light.

You pull the blanket up around your shoulders. The wool is soft and smells faintly of cedar from the chest where it was kept. The cushion is cool beneath your head.

The stars are very bright. The water is very still. The boat drifts, and turns, and drifts.

Lap. Knock. Whisper.

Your eyes grow heavy. The sky blurs softly into one wide glow.

The lake holds the boat. The boat holds you.

And you sleep, out on the quiet water, beneath all those stars.