Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, by Erica Goodkind

Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, Gian Lorenzo Bernini (Rome) 1651. Photo taken by the author, and courtesy of author.

Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi

Some conflict will arise
it is more than likely,
the Four Rivers agree,
coming together 
 
in an unlikely possibility.
Scissored and shackled, 
torn at the lips, poured 
into ceramic vessels, 

a pointed finger ordered them
to be told: Now, call this home.
Now, be some gods.
Now, here’s the rules.
 
Make yourselves Travertine.
Glide your currents
like electric guitars,
display yourselves in piazzas
 
like buskers. But no songbirds.
The River Tiber alone 
flows, is not set in stone.
Despite her embanked bed
 
she strolls onward toward 
the sea, sleep deprived, aware
of injustice to her family 
tree, acquiesced to accepting silver 
 
dreams with resigned indignity. 
Yes, some conflict will arise
claiming waterways, 
appropriating obelisks –
 
solidified sun, crepuscular rays
not carved from a single piece. 
Not prismatic. Not ecstatic.
Inaccurate, arrowlike, and gray.
 
Misinterpreted, like a dagger 
drawn to scratch an itch.
This is how wars begin –
with a muscle twitch.
 
Costumed mimes 
fixed in time, mute duty 
to amuse. Bending to thirst,
to blind applause, to eyes full 
 
of honeymoon wishes,
and liquid murk 
of history. Río de la 
Plata, Danube, 

Nile, and River Ganges.
I've become marble 
waiting for these weeping
gods to unfreeze.
 
Erica Goodkind

Erica Goodkind turns words into creatures resembling fiction, poetry, essays, satire, and more. Her non-fiction has appeared online with The Fanzine, her poetry in the University of Washington’s Capillaries Journal, her humor/satire with The Belladonna Comedy, and her short fiction in an anthology published by Sidekick Press, True Stories. Erica is currently an English Creative Writing major at the University of Washington in Seattle.