Rivr Watr by Kim Lozano

RIVR WATR, by Libby Reuter and Joshua Rowan, Missouri History Museum, 2014.

Rivr Watr

Only sunlight crowds
the unfilled pool at the old YMCA
deep in silence

White tiles once bright
young swimmers long dead
ghosts of immersion

On the wall the words
do not swim alone written in red
lettered scripture

The scent of chemicals lingers
like incense around the hollow well
empty of its blessing

This water too has joined the river
no children diving down to touch the drain
open valve of its tiny heart

Kim Lozano

Kim Lozano teaches creative writing workshops in St. Louis and co-directs the River Styx at the Tavern reading series. Her work has been published in Poetry Daily, The Iowa Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, The Journal, Midwestern Gothic, Denver Quarterly, Valparaiso Poetry Review, New Poetry from the Midwest, and elsewhere.