Installation artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude
meant to cover miles of Arkansas headwaters
in silver canopies. Their axiomatic structure
would’ve dimmed sunlight in riparian biomes,
disrupted trout migrations, blocked the route
of wildlife to a high prairie’s only water source,
eroded banks in parallel construction – the list
swells. In an alternate present, white rapids fade
as I float down the gorge on a blue plastic raft
and in the noon dark I miss my landing: a boulder
with a trailblaze and cairn on the beach. I’d meant
to camp there – with parachute cord and tarp