I've been searching for a fountain for this entire visit.
People don't seem to wish much here.
I had a two pence piece saved in my pocket
And I took it everywhere with me
Just in case.
And maybe as I walked it absorbed my uncertainty
My misery
My acceptance
My love and joy
Maybe it grew warm in my pocket with the weight of everything coursing through me for these weeks.
And here I am, sat alone and silent by a bubbling fountain
In a soaring white hall
And the light glances off coins in its depths
They glimmer and wink, giving the water a false glow.
So many wishes.
At the bottom, where the water drains, I can see them piled, half hidden by stone.
People who sat like I sit and poured their desires into a coin
Or people who walked casually past and, on a whim, found a penny and tossed it in,
Their wishes have collected here, like sand and pebbles at the emptying of a river,
The residue of us.
I take my coin out and hold it in my palm until it grows hot.
I have always known what to wish for before.
Every moment, always known where I wanted to go.
But this time I turn it over and over in my fingers, trying to read something divine in its ridges and valleys, its rough edges.
I think for a long time.
Finally, I decide
Not to decide.
"Help me."
"Save me."
"I want to be happy."
Because for the first time in my life
I don't know what will get me there.
I don't know what I want to happen.
I only know what I want to feel.
I want to be happy.
I want to be happy.
I want to be happy.
Help me be happy.
I repeat it in my mind, trying to find a clearer answer, a better wish,
But all that comes, cyclical, is "I want to be happy."
I throw the coin in and it sinks to the bottom, indistinguishable from the others.
I've made my wish.
So why do I feel so lost?