I remember hearing it before seeing it.
Feeling in the heart its cosmic hum.
Pulse of blood rushing to the temples.
Heavy rollercoastering roar of current.
Its turquoise, jade body inescapably ceding
to gravity’s ominous pull.
It was that high tide inside oneself. Immensity’s
perpetual aortic leap into the drop of the abyss.
As I look at the erasures of us in those faded
Polaroids & Kodaks, only now I realize that we
too, amidst those endless crowds of tourists,
were no more than drops of water falling.
H2O particles. Spritz from life’s colossal flow.
River of consciousness eternally brimming,
cascading over the escarpment or the universe.
Niagara Falls was our refuge from tedium.
So many times we went down there from sweltering
Sunday afternoons for a change in atmosphere.
How wondrous when visitors came from overseas
yearning to see the Honeymoon Capital of the World!
Gladly we drove them through the highways
to wine country, Clifton Hill & Lundy’s Lane.
We sat and picnicked on the grass
where multitudes had stood before.
They say the sun was out when Annie Edson
survived her barrel trip over God’s water slide.
They say her agents had wolfish eyes.
Just tried to make a buck out of her skill.
But they too are gone now. I saw postcards
of her story and her name’s in all the gift shops.
The world’s sightseers are all here taking photos
& buying souvenirs. Soon they will drive off
to be replaced tomorrow and tomorrow
after that by new faces in search of wonder,
each one repeating, sparkling, falling
on the radiant, arched green of time’s precipice.
Invisible life force calling all of our names.
Oh mighty river, my heart is in your hands!
Source: The author, 2026.
This poem won second place in the Niagara Falls Poetry Project 25th Anniversary Poetry Competition. It will be published with all the other entrants in a print anthology to be published by Phylum Press. To reserve a copy of the anthology please email aporteus@niagarapoetry.ca. A companion volume exploring the poetry over 6 centuries will also soon be available, and may be reserved ahead of time.
Josie Di Sciascio-Andrews has written seven collections of poetry and two non-fiction books. Her work appears in various journals and anthologies among which: Canadian Literature, The Malahat Review, Descant, The Canada Literary Review, Acta Victoriana, Canadian Poetry Review, The Blue Nib and Lothlorien, among others. Her poetry won first prize in the 2023 International Poetry Prize in Rome’s Antonio De Ferraris contest. Her poem “The First Time I Heard Leonard Cohen” was nominated for the 2022 Pushcart Prize. Her latest book of poems, A Nomenclature for Light was released September 2025 by Mosaic Press. One of her poems “Quantum Sparks in the Tabernacle,” was the first place winner of the 2025 Ontario Poetry Society’s Long Poem Prize. Josie is a member of The League of Canadian Poets, the Ontario Poetry Society, the Italian Canadian Writers Association and The Heliconian Club for Women in the Literary Arts. She teaches workshops for Poetry in Voice and is the host & coordinator of The Oakville Literary Cafe series.