Lake fill (poem)

1.

Schooner, vessel. Unwrap

decades of accumulation: wet clay,

rhyme, diversion.

Long crossed-out: this airless tomb

of tempered wood. Exhumed,

bare-skin and bone,

a glossary, exposed claw-damp

begins to oxidize.

2.

Scalpel-strips

of layers, waterfront. A catalogued

dementia: two

centuries of sleep. Padded earth

they set for salvage, restitution,

new foundations: rail

of Grand Trunk.

3.

Repurposed, raised

, what hastens speed: invention.

Intact beams are sharpened, shift

to upkeep Historic Fort York.

Wood

of equal vintage, timber,

tender. Walks upon, erodes. The faintest tinge

of slow.

4.

Erasure: drowning, dry land. Double-masted,

fifty foot of sail-set; driven,

run aground. Had weathered

every storm. So purposeful:

mid-century, stone-sunk, reshaped

as scaffolding

for Queens Wharf. Set

your body down.

5.

Oh how she scoons,

they would have said.

The lake shrinks slowly,

swells.