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.
