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Stems asks whether youthful balance came from willows, breath, reed, and river movement, ending with a turn from private origin to forward motion.

The poem is delicate and concentrated, built from breath, bending wood, and stream movement. Its question about youth is really a question about form: where does balance come from, and how is it carried? The final phrase, or the run, keeps the lyric moving instead of letting it settle into a static image.

Stems locates the rhythm of a life in breathing through a reed under a river's stream. The childhood imagery of willows becomes a theory of survival — breathe through the current, on the rum, keep the rhythm hidden beneath the water.