There’s scientists who

Study rivers feeding forests.

Nitrogen travelling

in the Bodies of salmon from oceans belly

Carrying a special isotope, so

They can see the fish in the tree rings and leaf samples.

It’s simple,

Wolves eats salmon heads

(canines get sick off a gut parasite in the salmon and die)

So there’s headless fish fertilizing forests

While bear grabs a snack for the land,

Digesting that dorsal muscle and egg sack to

Fatten up, leaving a carcass that

Expands in biomass as

Diptera fly maggots become that N15 signature.
The unfathomable mass of a salmon spawn
growing through death, through life as

Hymenoptera (Parasitic wasp) and

Coleopters (Burying beetle),

Expand salmon's affluence

And the wren’s, singing salmon songs
catch that n15 nitrogen in flight, held in feather

…
This is

the forest herself, feasting

Making love with the ocean.

A potlatch, a great giving,

…

Salmon – ocean blowing kisses

To majestic wild forests –
Salmon - Subsidizing this terrestrial

Community of nitrogen hungry

False lilies
Salmon-berry-bushes,

Cedar.

 - Now living
expressions of ocean’s love song -

…

And forest holds those fragile eggs in stream beds
giving delicious shade and clean water to those fish
for years before heading on their journey that will
always return,

And forest, a key determinant of salmon health
                                     Which is human health.

Our habitat, the result of

     This gift economy,

                 This giving ecology

May our living be Our dance, our praise of being caught

Between the love affair of Abundant ocean and forest.
And river,

Ever feeding ocean fresh water to sooth Her salty breath.