The Los Angeles river flows along concrete. Vanowen St. is where, I travel by and over the river every day; from Calabasas to home again. A water flow that is older than this congested city, that grew up around it now controlling the wet flow. I still hear its watery whisper, Knowing wild animals, still transverse these pure and dirty waters. The flowing hill waters still carry, a harmony of wild-ness. Resonating in the glowing eyes of the raccoon, skunk and coyote, that I have viewed at night. Taking me back to my wild days, of roaming the same hills, dipping my feet, into the same streams that flow, forming the Los Angeles River. Once I had a dream. I was playing on a golf course near Canoga Ave. A mound formed on the grass, Slowly a grayish woman came forward out of the grass. A full aboriginal woman covered with grey earth. It was not so much of what I witnessed there, but how she made me feel, A pure wild freedom of earth and sky, projected out towards me. Quickly she turned to run south up Canoga Ave. Running and galloping with her wild animals. They also came up and ran as a strong wind, forward. My heart and mind wanted to go with her. I still wonder where she went and who she was? Circulating the San Fernando Valley, my home town and where I was born, where I most likely will die. Here is where I will have my body cremated, at the base of Bell Creek and Arroyo Calabasas, my ashes freely thrown. How confronting this seems to me. Last night while leaning on a city tree, that hums up food from the good earth, I think about my home and the Los Angeles river. I look up to see, The pushy Saturn has fallen, the Pleiades now greets me, The cool grass on my bare feet feels great, my soul is listening to an epiphany of a whispering river. Sometimes calling me late at night; Real comfort and that same wild-ness. I heard as a child! Now I have come back to hearing it again. Sounding all at once, like a shrill, scratching, glass chimes, circulating in the wind. ~ Hudley Flipside
***
Westfield Village Westfield-topanga-public-art-display- About the Los Angeles River
Los Angeles early photos
The Los Angeles River’s official beginning is at the confluence of two channelized streams – Bell Creek and Arroyo Calabasas – in the Canoga Park section of the city of Los Angeles, just east of California State Route 27, at 34.1952°N 118.601838°W (the east side of Canoga Park High School). Bell Creek flows east from the Simi Hills, and Arroyo Calabasas flows north from the Santa Monica Mountains. From there the river flows east through a concrete flood control channel and very soon receives Browns Canyon Wash, which flows south from the Santa Susana Mountains. The river then bends slightly south and receives Aliso Canyon Wash, whose watershed adjoins that of Browns Canyon. The river then flows through the district of Winnetka, then Reseda and enters the Sepulveda Basin, a flood-control reservoir formed by the Sepulveda Dam.[4][5][6][7]