Aquaria Poem by Ruth Rouff
I had this idea I would write about the old aquarium in Camden, not the new. The old one had indigenous fish that live in the slate grey waters off New Jersey-the kind few deigned to see. That is why they renovated the place. Set aside or killed the flounder and bass and bluefish you might just as soon find on a dinner plate as in a tank and replaced them with tropicals: floating mosaics from a Byzantine ceiling. These are the creatures people pay to see. Now the turnstiles are humming and I find myself viewing delicate beauties, as well as sharks swimming overhead, rambunctious penguins, and one lone alligator lying in a tiled tank, waiting, as we all are, for something good.
Ruth Rouff is an English instructor and educational writer living in Collingswood, NJ. In addition to being published in a number of literary journals, she has written two young adult nonfiction books. Her poetry/creative nonfiction collection Pagan Heaven will appear this November.
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