Perhaps this fountain was once beautiful. Perhaps it once shot water gracefully into the air before returning it to its home and beginning the cycle over again. Perhaps its ruddy brick foundation once served as a colorful backdrop for the crystal clear water, and perhaps kids and adults alike peered into the rippling water to see the coins others threw in before shutting their eyes tight and letting their own coins fly from their fingers, hoping it serves as a symbol of releasing their dreams and desires to the great unknown, hoping that by some strange magic the universe will draw the wish from the fountain and make it come true. 

Perhaps. 

Now, the brick foundation still stands with faded colors and missing pieces. The water, where it should have been teeming with life, now stands still and quiet. The water doesn’t shoot into the air or even roam the fountain — it stands. The crystal clear color has been traded for a murky brown green, forbidding wandering eyes from gazing upon another’s wishes and keeping them on the surface, leaving each one to simply see its own reflection in the dirty water. Wish after wish has been replaced with dirt and candy wrappers and trash that couldn’t find a home. 

This, that used to house magic and possibility and hope, has been reduced to a sad container for murky waters. 

How do we continue when we feel the magic disappear, when we feel hope sink to the bottom and mud and mire cloud our view? How do we go on when we look at the place where we once released our dreams and desires and see it reduced to rubble and dirt? Do we abandon our drowning hope, turn away from the crumbling foundation and let the trash pile up?

Or do we continue to try and peer through the trash and mire, continue to see through the darkness and grab onto hope? Do we continue to trust that our hopes and dreams will fall past the mud and traverse the still, dirty water to find the last glimmer of magic and land there, safe from harm? 

Do we continue to cast our wishes on murky waters, to shut our eyes and release our dreams into the unknown?