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Defenders we travel inland

along rivers and in and out

of streams knowing lotic

systems and unidirectional

flow—riffles glides and pools

the angle at which light strikes

leading to light lost to reflection

Knowing biofilm and water column

algae—moss and liverwort

knowing duckweed and water

hyacinth invasive hydrilla and

cattail tops emerging from

slow water and bladderwort

feeding on small captured organism

Knowing sinuosity and substrate

crayfish with their feather-like gills

salamander and trout and

oolichan and the riparian zone

with otter and beaver and mink and

wolf and bear midst salmon spawning

then alevin then parr then smolt 

Knowing especially the salmon and

bear and cedar and salmon cycling

nitrogen back from seas knowing

magnetoception and the names of

rivers salmon return to and this

circle is love and nowhere does it

include oil spilling from burst pipes