Aquifer of Glass

Beneath the city the aquifer rehearses light, a slow orchestra of seep and stone, combing the roots with patient fingers.

In the laundromat, a washer spins a private weather, clouds of lint, the hiss of coins, someone humming a map they never drew.

I think of the water as a courier, carrying the mineral gossip of decades, the taste of old rain, the name of a buried tree.

Above, neon spills its alphabet into puddles, letters drifting, unclaimed, as if the street is learning to speak.