What did they expect to find when they got at me?
At first, the lid was stuck, my air was thin,
I was at their mercy.
And then it was a hacksaw that revealed me:
Up from the river I came—
I was wet—and dizzy
—and deafened by the ringing of the bells,
but I could tell
that every part of me
was new!
I was exactly what I had expected:
I was alive—
and I was what I had to show for it.
So I didn't stand serenely
like Jesus in the Jordan on his baptism day,
the sky opening and closing around him—
I had to work my own riggings,
supply my own light
—on that day I finally
came alive —
there—beneath the mantel of the Horseshoe,
with the slender Bridal Veil, shimmering to my right
—and everyone's eyes on me,
everyone's hands, handing me along,
steadying me—reaching out to touch me.
You can see the Hallelujah in their eyes—
for that one moment—
before their lids screwed down again,
and they realized
I wasn't quite what they'd expected.
(Excerpt from Joan Murray's narrative poetry
--Queen of the Mist, about Annie Taylor, who in 1901,
became the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.)
I am going to take the girls to Niagara Falls.
And then I will reward myself with some alone time
like this.