a river tugs

A river tugs at whatever is within reach, trying to set it afloat and carry it downstream.  Living trees are undermined and washed away.  No piece of driftwood is safe, though stranded high up the bank; the river will rise to it, and away it will go.

The river extends this power of drawing all things with it even to the imagination of those who live on its banks.  Who can long watch the ceaseless lapsing of a river's current without conceiving a desire to set himself adrift, and, like the driftwood which glides past, float with the stream clear to the final ocean?

~ Harlan Hubbard

from Shantyboat - A River Way of Life