Dancing water sloshed

At the edge of gray

Slate, weary and washed

By a thousand coins, as the day

 

Gaped from the gap above. Broken

Floor-to-sky foundation, tired cracks.

Steady toss-chip-tumble tokens

Dug in deep. The architect’s facts

 

Ignored wish-fueled erosion, material

Chosen to swallow the glaring sun

Lies brittle and dry, a burial

Of whispered aspiration. One by one,

 

Tiles seep and shift to press

The tidal drag. Ten thousand cubic feet

Lost to ceramic distress,

Once upon a time wet and neat,

 

Now caged by empty glass walls

Mocked by ill-timed, temperate rain.

With dreams of glossy waterfalls

Intact in crass inscription, will it train

 

The eye and ear and heart

On what’s no longer within reach?

The wishing fountain wills itself a part

Of resurrection from the unintended breach

 

Of contact. At the center, a boat

Or a paper plane in copper, brushed.

Postmodern misdirection left to gloat

Over snap of sealants and lazy work of grouters, rushed.

 

 

by Meryl McQueen

 

Meryl McQueen is an American writer living in Sydney. Born in South Africa, she grew up in Europe and the U.S. Before turning to writing full-time, she was a social worker, counselor, college professor, researcher, and grant writer. She earned her doctorate in linguistics from the University of Technology, Sydney, her master’s in public administration from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and her bachelor of science in education and social policy from Northwestern. Meryl speaks several languages and has lived in seven countries. She loves to play piano, sing, hike in the woods, and cook. Her poetry has been published in Blue Lake Review, Clearfield Review, Crack the Spine, The Critical Pass Review, Dunes Review, Ginosko, Ozone Park Journal, Phoebe, RiverSedge, the Set Free Anthology, The Tower Journal, Town Creek Review, Vanguard in the Belly of the Beast, and Yellow Moon.

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