Dave Bonta's "Watermen" is a short, compressed poem about being caught in the space between things. The opening lines pair words that sound alike but mean different things: "fast and feast," "foul weather fair weather," "here and where." Each pair sets up a gap, between hunger and plenty, bad conditions and good, a known place and an unknown one. The river sits in that gap, as both a path and a boundary.
The second stanza shifts to "we," and the speaker sounds determined. They entered the water "with resolve," as if committing to something serious. The comparison to "a great ore" is strange and rich. Judging by the imagery, the river might feel like something dense and valuable to be mined, or the people might be entering it the way one enters rock, pushing into something heavy and resistant.
The mood is quiet, steady and a little mysterious. The poem doesn't explain what the "watermen" are after, and that leaves a feeling of work, risk and respect for the river's power.