Terminal Lake



Although they know no other waters
and have no creation myths,
the fish don't like it here: no way out,
no river to swim upstream or down.
Terminal Lake squats there,
its belly filled by springs, oh rain
and ice and snow. It's deep,
Terminal Lake, and no one's gone to the bottom
and come back up.
All's blind down there, and cold.
From above, it's a huge black coin,
it's as if the real lake is drained
and this lake is the drain: gaping, language-
less, suck- and sinkhole.


-Thomas Lux