This stump of stream sounds real
as any other, even smells the same,
mineral-sweet with a tang of leaf
though flowing not to sea
but to a central well whose pumps
fill the peripheral trench
to spill over the inner concrete lip
and down to the hollow center
of a circular waterfall.

I sat here as an undergraduate for hours,
water tinkling like a muted xylophone
above the background hiss and glug
but now it's dry, its circling trench
a reservoir of stagnant water
where strands of algae flutter
above bottle caps and newspapers
and a few coins. Its natural stones,
purloined from stream or beach,
once darkly glistening, have dried
dull mustard in the sun.

I think of running water as
the white noise meant to cleanse
the way between us all, the inevitable
Tao of running down,
the ultimately indiscriminate lover
flattering every shape by imitation.
Nothing is humbler.

I make a wish, my coin bounces off the rocks,
my right thumb turns to glass,
my hand drops with a splash on paving bricks,
my head bursts into droplets
and where my shape stood
squats a pile of soggy clothes:
I fill the fountain.

C. E. CHAFFIN edits The Melic Review . Widely published on the net and more narrowly in print, he fears he will be more remembered for his criticism than his poetry.

His one book (of poems, Elementary, Edwin Mellen Press, 1997) is available through Amazon.com, where it ranks below over 650,000 titles in popularity:

The spoken word scene, in general, makes him ill for lack of craft and surfeit of self-congratulatory narcissism. Since making these opinions known he has not been invited to read in LA again.

He has never been published in Poetry, Ploughshares, or The Paris Review, lives in Long Beach, CA, and is presently on disability for manic-depression and intractable spinal pain. In other words, if he were a horse, he'd be shot. But he is a happy horse, with three young fillies from previous stud duties and a beautiful new mare.

Shoe size on request; same as mouth.

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