This is a piece I recently submitted to a writing contest, responding to the picture of a woman and man near a waterfall.

I have been here ever since, I shall be here evermore, crashing from River above to Pool below, a lagoon I have carved into Rock at my feet. I have no name, but I am eternal, persistent, and powerful—what the two-legged creatures who come to witness call Waterfall. 

I am never still, always dashing and splashing, spraying foam on granite walls seeking vainly to contain me. My colour changes constantly, chaotically, from green to ebony. As I fall, I throw off clouds of mist—wet, wraithlike wisps that first seek the sky, then drift and look to hide until, discovered by Sun’s relentless rays, surrender to the light that banishes such elusive phantoms from his gaze.

I speak no language, but am heard by any who choose to listen. The thunder of my precipitous plunge to Pool is overpowering, rendering all around me mute. Waves ebb to ripples, spreading across Pool’s surface in incessant arcs, caressing her furthest, moss-lined shore more gently than ever I could.

In darkness of Night, I am invisible, save for a gentle luminescence belying the pitiless power driving me. But I am never silent, and I do not sleep.

In light of Day, I cast beauteous bows of colour spanning the spectrum into the air as Sun awakes to turn trees of green to gold. Pool traps their images in her mirrored mere, quicksilver and cold, and her surface reflects Sun back to bluing sky above, a demonic diamond-dance of light atop the waves.

The two-legs have come forever to marvel at my might and menace. They came first in animal-skins, clutching spears; then in helmet and breastplate, grasping swords; more recently in camouflage, wielding guns. They come still, clad mostly in thin strips of colourful cloth that shield them from each other’s greedy gaze. But unfailingly, they gape at me with awe.

There is one in front of me right now, on Pool’s far shore, one of those the two-legs call Woman, her arms raised in obeisance, eyes agog, nostrils flared, ears cocked—all her senses fiercely attuned to the freak of nature I am. Her companion, a creature they call Man, picks his way across the rocky shore to fetch the little device they hold in front of them to record my presence, to memorialize my magnificence.

It is as if they think I can be captured, contained, conjured later for their puerile pleasure.

As if!

In fact, I have captured many of them, a truth that has never dissuaded others from approaching too closely. They speak of finding a way to peek behind my watery curtain, wondering what mysteries I hide from view. They dip their toes in Pool’s shiny water, sorely tempted to savour her silky caress. I simply watch and wait, and when they succumb to ambitions beyond their capabilities, they succumb to me.

More two-legs than I care to count lie atop Rock on Pool’s murky bottom, perfectly preserved by her icy-cold water, too deep to be disturbed by the currents that stir her upper levels. I feel no guilt, for it is the two-legs’ hubris that ensnares them, not I.

Even now, seemingly oblivious to the danger, Woman is coming closer, her long hair drenched by the spray I toss off. She picks her way carefully across the slippery surface of the shoreline, alternately glancing down to ensure her footing, then up at me, enraptured by my grandeur.

Man reappears, clutching his device, motioning Woman ever closer. She stops to pose, moves nearer, poses again. Her body is glistening-wet now, she is shivering slightly, but still she comes on. And then, as so many others have before her, she slips on Rock, teeters precariously, then falls into my churning maw. Her screams of terror are lost in the pounding roar of my majesty.

Man drops his device, rushes forward, slips and trips, picks himself up, madly throws himself into Pool, thrashes his way towards me, frantic to get to where Woman sank from view, irretrievably gone. And then, with no warning, he, too, is taken.

Although they will not be found, I know others will eventually come in search of these latest foolish victims, and as ever, I await them. I feel no remorse, for I am but a force of nature—uncaring, ordained to do what I do, unimpeded by reckless, feckless two-legs.

I am Waterfall.