the merry-go-round is bound to the earth with vines, grown like ropes meant to stifle the spin of a joyous monster. a metal slide sits a kilter, the bottom third half buried. it is attached at the top to one rotting post. a second post lay fallen in the dirt away from the slide, shoved in anger, maybe, by windy time. an entire wood surrounds this abandoned playground, a wood forty years old, no less. forty years of play-less existence. the frame of a swing set, holds up the trunk of a lightning struck tree. it is leaning, slightly, under the trunks weight. chains and seats lay submerged in the dirt, lifeless and lonely.
two rusted chains hold a lone empty swing in tack. it swings gently, a metronome. silence cut by the rusty squeak of chain in rhythm....
