Hot Lake Hotel

Bunker of brick, its grim defenestrated facade

the haunt of swallows colonizing rafters for a cliff.

And this was famous- dilapidation's resort

fronted by a black, smoking pool ancestors soaked their flesh in.

Termites and rats, rabid deconstructionists,

conspire to interpret "wood" for "food,"

parsing floor and crossbeam towards a meaning

only they can fathom.

For them, text is texture they can stomach-

wood, brick, copper wire- addicts

whose health is not these waters

but the building they inhabit as if it were the traveler,

passing through them to the ground.

Shutters flap like pages, publishing decay.

An empty ballroom vibrates to the strains of silence,

or wind nosing through dank corridors.

Two Greek columns-split and fluted-flank the entrance

welcoming all who would harbor their aching bones.