Dying In the Water

On Sundays,

Some obscure denomination

Gathers here in robes to plunge

And die beneath the troubled waters,

Rising to a spiritual life

New.

Under,

Sunlight breaks into outlines of cobblestones,

The blue streaks echoing the waves.

The rivers carried military veteran corpses

From the bloody fields of civil war,

The final fading cries,

Destroyed soldiers grasping 

Dire loss of everything,

Releasing loose

Tomorrow.

Turtles peek and disappear again

Below the languid surface

Rippled by the warmer wind.

I once more investigate my phone.

You haven't sent a message

Either through electric waves

Or in an actual bottle.

I pry loose another pebble,

Tossing solid earth into the chaotic unknown

Without form, void.

- 1/12/26