I went to Little River to see what he saw
fixed his lens upon, measuring the light
waiting for a precise moment
when the quiet river, at its end,
meets the roiling surf or placid calm
of ocean wave breaking on coastal shores;
the sun beginning to descend
over a far edge that no one can see
or be there on its horizon plane.

His day at Little River is fixed
forever in black and white
in the quiet drift of day’s ending.
Mine, a shifting gray swirl
of maritime mist in movement
concealing the near rock formations
pounded in surf, then revealed, thinly.

For years his image of Little River,
emptying itself into pacific reaches,
hung before me, beckoning
while I worked in bureaucracy tedium.
One day, I thought, I would go there
to the sea and Little River
having travelled my course
seen at last my way
to the place where Little River
lost itself in the whole
and the wholly beautiful.

Portland, Oregon – September, 2016

The header photograph is my cell phone photo of an Ansel Adams calendar print of “Grass, reeds, water – near Little River, Northern California, 1959.” I visited there not long ago and stood, I believe, in the approximate location where he must have taken his beautifully constructed photograph. The beach area has been trampled over by many and a concrete parking lot with RV’s looms nearby. But, Little River remains, quietly emptying itself from its sources into the Pacific ocean. I had hoped it would be more pristine, lost in some magical past. But, it sits directly beside the traffic of Highway 101 on the California coast, just south of Mendocino.

On the day we were there, the marine layer prevented the ancient view that Mr. Adams had, plus I sort of detracted from the view.  His photograph of Little River is my favorite among his many incredible photographs of Yosemite and the American west.