//------------------------------//
// Five 
// Story: Salmon Run 
// by mushroompone 
//------------------------------//

When the skeletal branches of winter trees begin to bud,

their leaves thrumming beneath the bark,

the salmon leave their home to explore.

What awaits them in the deep blue waters of the ocean?

What do they feel as they fly away from those familiar pools and streams?

What unknowable feeling in their fins

in their scales

in their hearts

tells them it is time to leave home?

Asks them to leave behind those corridors lined with well-worn pebbles

in search of something more?

Do they know they are bound by fate

to thrash through the whitewater

to be plucked

ripe and red

from those icy creeks

by hungry bears and swift eagles

on the way to frenzied death in the pools of home?

Do they leave home with no intention of returning?

Or do they leave because they feel

the very act of leaving

makes coming home finally feel real?