Fountain of Memory

A poem that captures a random encounter of kindness at a Philadelphia landmark.

Has there ever been anything more glorious than golden hours in April? 
Silver shimmers across the fountain’s face, dancing playfully in the breeze. 
The Franklin Institute stands in a steadfast silhouette against the setting sun. 
A young man in front of me captures the moment on his phone…
but then he walks away before I get the chance 
to tell him he is now a part of the poem. 

In his absence, the mist kisses my eyelashes. 
I blink between memories. 
I’m thrown into history.

I remember when my sister went to the art school across the street, 
so while my mom helped her sort her laundry, my friends and I 
would flee to this fountain to ideate on what our lives 
might look like when we lived in the city one day. 

I remember when I came here with my crew of closeted friends 
after we spent the afternoon volunteering at MANNA for our GSA. 
I remember us rolling in the sunlit grass, pretending to be people we weren’t. 

So many times I’ve come here alone, 
pulled back down to earth by the fountain’s gravity. 
The swans have long whispered to me that this space 
is somewhere safe and sacred to just be.

A young woman nearby pulls me from the reverie as her friend snaps a picture. 
“Am I holding the water?” she asks with a laugh. 
Then they switch places and take turns at making new remembrances 
in the same space where mine feel like distant, faded attic polaroids. 

I wonder if I should tell them that their moment made me smile.
Before fear has a chance to talk me out of it, 
I pick up the courage like it’s a lost key on the ground. 
and walk up saying, “So I don’t mean to be weird,” 
and am met with nothing but kindness and smiles 
as I explain they have made their way into the poem too. 

Their names are Madison and Natalie, and I tell them 
the only thing I know to be irrefutably true. 
“I am a poet.”

From there, I anxiously admit that I often watch as
poems of ephemeral beauty unfold before me, 
but never have I managed to thank these strangers 
for how much of an honor it was to witness their joy. 

I think back to those beautiful memories I have of being here, 
and how unlike these two, there exist no photos that prove them. 
There are no snapshots of my mother, my sister, and I when we were here.
None of us had cameras in our phone in 2009 to have captured 
that sunny afternoon with friends, some of whom I'd never see again. 

These lovely strangers do not know all the darkness I hold in,
or how much their frivolity brightened my soul as the hour grew late. 

While the sun sinks lower, it dawns on me 
that neither do I know their lives. 
I do not know what battles they have fought, 
or the things they regret. I don’t know who 
they’ve loved and how much they’ve lost. 

All that any of us know is that we are here. 
That on this random evening, we met awkwardly and laughed genuinely 
and did our best to live through what pixels will only hold an instant of. 

We shared existence for only a flicker, 
but in that wink of twilight, 
we were here.

⧝

This poem surprised me in so many ways, but in no way more than how it boosted my confidence in actually speaking to the strangers I sometimes write into my work. I’ve had a lot of moments with folks that were fleeting, several of which y’all will get to read in my upcoming book, CONNECTING ROUTES, which is out in July. But never before has a moment struck me as so lovely that I wanted to share with the people in it that they’ve become part of my own life story.

Shout out to the two ladies who were so cool with me coming up to them, and even asked to grab a photo with me to capture the moment. I hope more than anyone that they get to enjoy this piece, and that for anyone who reads it, it may inspire you to live your day with just a little more gentleness.

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Featured photos by Elayna Mae Darcy © 2025