This is motivated by a translation of the Massachusett word Wichagusscussett, as "The place at the edge of the pouring out". Roughly meaning, the place by the estuary. This is the name of the land between the two estuaries, the Fore River and the Back River that border on Weymouth, Quincy, and Hingham Massachusetts

The place at the edge of the pouring out

It is time to talk about the rivers

both the one that is running in the fore

and the one that is waiting in the back

of deep memory where all the water

that is left can be made to form the tears

that burn holes through time with their load of salt 

That which makes them what they are is the salt

Laid down before life, before the rivers

ran from the high ground as skies gave up tears

to meet the arriving tide at the fore

All their hope carried forth in this water

from the hills down to the curve of the back

Still wild and full of secrets is the back

Sea lettuce and horseshoe crabs follow salt

as it mixes with the sky’s own water

Heron’s and eel’s lives, are lives of rivers 

The dark mud and mussels reach to the fore

where they meet the shale shedding shells and tears

A carpet of broken shells draws no tears

as tough as barnacles on a crab’s back

The shipyard and factories of the fore

bring heavy traffic flowing with the salt

Working ships are what make working rivers

By day, casting shadows on the water

At night whales rise up from icy water

I know them but in their eyes are the tears

that I shed as a boy, crying rivers

Now they have come for me, to bring me back

to the time when I was nothing but salt

Now to heal them and bring them to the fore

At the edge pouring out into the fore

is where I will find a home near water

the land stained with the blood and with the salt

of lives dissolved by an ocean of tears

Wave songs calling me and pulling me back

to the place where I rose up from rivers

Raise the rivers once again to the fore

and carry me back to the cold water

where the tears of ancient salt fall with joy