Update...

Just wanted you all to know that the Mother's Day poem received 2nd place in the SWG short manuscript awards :)

Thanks!

Thanks to Ariel for organizing this, and thanks to all of you for the poems you've shared. Participating in the project has been stimulating and energizing, and I've enjoyed following everyone's work over the course of the month. See you next year...

another year, another may day

Hey all,

Thanks again for participating in year five of the May Day Poetry Project.

It's always good to see what people are working on - and working through - over the course of the month.

I didn't meet my goal of posting a poem a day this year but I'm pleased with the baker's dozen of poems I did write and was ESPECIALLY pleased at being able to get such good feedback so quickly.

I hope to see some/all of you next year!

Yours,

Ariel

p.s. Please feel free to post if/when poems that had their genesis here are accepted for publication...

June. It's the new May.

Well I'm all tapped out. A few in "draft" that I managed to finish off, buried down there sad and alone. I wrote my crow narrative out, it's not really poetry but oh well. I suddenly have a vision for a manuscript based on a few of these that I think would be epic if I could get it done quickly enough.

This was great. I loved the crows, the French sur la lune, the boxing, the Edisons, the letters, the Yukon, Ellie and Jay, the little green man although he only showed up once, and nature in all nature's glory.

I'm sure I missed listing things I loved.

This pushed me to write lots and regularly - very helpful to read other works, and give/receive feedback.

Thanks Ariel for organizing this. And thanks to all the rest of you for showing up, in-putting, and putting out :) I will miss you all.

win


you’re too shy to howl
at fluorescents in the locker room,
and besides, don’t have the breath

just inch jeans up sticky legs, towel hair,
watch the rest of the fight card with one eye –
the other focused inside the skin
of your adrenalin, surveying change

À la prochaine...

.
The 31 days of May have come and gone all too quickly once again. Thank you all so much for sharing your voices as well as your ears! I am a better reader and writer for this safe haven called May Day. Et toujours, vous m'aidez . . .
Have a wonderful summer!
.

Once Upon My Porch

Planting day is either soggy gray
or wavy hot with all the water
dried up in the plant saucers.
Too wet before lunch, we took
a ride, like when Goldilocks’ bears
took a walk thinking it would
fix the porridge,
but that was a cold mess.
Either way I’m getting nothing potted
and the baby larkspur sprouts
nodding floppy pink and blue heads
are wasting in their black plastic
four-pack cradles, crinkly,
in serious need of a change before
the blazing day is out
and my fumbled delays
leave everything wet
sliding downhill
into the growing
compost heap.

--------

Thanks for all the good writing this month. I've been off celebrating G's birthday but wanted to get back for the last day. All the comments and help have been most appreciated. It's been good to see this project growing and the ways it pushes my writing.

Apologies

I apologize for falling off the map here, I have been so incredibly busy this month I just haven't had any time at all to write more Crow poems. I've been far to busy rewriting the rest of the novel when I have any spare time at all. It's been much, much busier than I ever expected and quite stressful. I'm going to write those poems but I'm just so far behind, it's a lost cause for May obviously. If this site is still running over June, I'll post them in spurts over the next two weeks, as I also catch up on reading other people's poems. So my May was a failure but I'm glad to see you've all been kicking my ass, poetry-wise!

after


you thought you’d sleep, wake relieved,
never think again of fighting

but the days after fit poorly, plain and aimless
without the thrill, threat, of the ring

you hug the pain that flashes between ribs –
body’s memory of fists – carry it close for weeks
until it disintegrates, muscles regress
and you’re left with photos, trophy,
a story you’ll write sometime

Many

Wie viel sind deine Werk'

Red-shafted flicker, red-winged blackbird, redstart.

Ruby-throated hummingbird, rose-breasted grosbeak, redpoll.

Purple finch (which is red).

Yellowthroat, yellow warbler, goldfinch.

Yellowlegs, goldeneye, yellow-headed blackbird.

Yellow-bellied sapsucker, too.

Bluebird, bluejay, great blue heron,

and blue-winged teal.

[Wie viel... How many are your works]

afternoon, (ix)

Apple is her name
but they called
her Mother Mercy,
a girl who nourished
the world's wounded
with love and
spare words
...........one day
she ran out and
no one was there
to nourish poor Apple
with words or
with care

At the corner café
she sits by the window
sipping on her yerba maté.
.

Thanks!

For a wonderful May adventure everyone. My apologies for not getting to the poems in the last few weeks; life has a poetic way of intruding on the poetry. Thanks as well to all of you that made comments on the poems. The saga of Jay and Ellie will continue when I have more time to plot and write their story. And to muddle Mr. Churchill a bit:

We shall write on the seas and oceans, we shall write with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall write on the landing grounds, we shall write in the fields and in the streets, we shall write in the hills; we shall never surrender!

McCandless

you did it
went wild

deep into green trees Nenana River moose elk bears
lingon berries crowberries salmonberries
hedysarum alpinum rhizoctonia leguminicola

listen
all you hear are the creaking of trees
as they move with wind
a snap of branches from an animal unseen
the bang of your gun
your thoughts through your voice
if you choose to speak alone

here you are
at-one-ment
away from every human soul

you looked happy on the Stampede trail
leaned casually against a bus
relic of Fairbank City Transit
relic of Yutan Construction 1963

complete liberty
you found it
with hardships you couldn’t have guessed

the lone wolf cries
you die in isolation

are you lonely
or just alone
tragic either way
for you to march
into woods subsist
off land then starve in 1992

your bus attracts pilgrims now
you’re commemorated
in song film book hearts imagination

you could have lived instead

lost in

Yukon not on Fodor’s 2003 map
thanks for Aca Nada

past’s men and women
read newspapers seated on grass
wait for decisions on eternal fates
trouble is geography and history
cannot be distinguished
with a visible birthmark
like identical twins

outsiders come
for adventure to get away
from debts old boyfriends
from the people they were
but did not want to be
dreams lost in archaeological
layers of time

1 am

sleepdrugged and dreamheavy the phone shrills
becomes part of illogical night-time narrative until
the cell goes off by my ear. Garbled

conversation drifts, insinuates, clears, urges, stares
resignedly into nightmare's window: mind struggles to separate
the curtains between awake and asleep

and i am driving, can't remember how
i got dressed, what i am wearing
only where i need to go, and that it's already

too late. and somehow the quarter moon
lies improbably heavy in the southwest, an unwanted
section of an orange left on an empty table.

boxing club


the hardest part of boxing
is pushing yourself
through the door that first time,
down stairs to the dingy-dim,
reek of effort and old gloves,
throb of heavy metal

all biceps and sweat
muscle shirts and mashed noses
until you look closer: unicorn tattoo
on a thick shoulder, butterfly stickers
glittering on the bulb of a glove

return once, twice, and the door gets lighter,
three times, four, and leaving –
stepping into air and sunshine –
becomes a punch to the face

Edisonia: Corporal of the Guard, No. 1

Our boy, having dismounted from the train
after a long day of others’ doings, others’ pulp
& newsprint shadows, walked to the paddock,

his empty belly a drum, his extra papers
a suit of armour, a sensational buffer between
his small bed & the long shelves & heavy

afternoons in the Detroit Public Library.
Michael Oates, footsore, dirty, would sway behind him
on the horse as it ambled through the ink-pot night

its hooves setting clip-clop type,
its hide against their legs softer than rag-paper,
its gait smooth & predictable

all the way home. On the way, they’d pass the lit
& bustling fort & nearly every night a relay
from man to man would sound through

the cooling night:
Corporal of the Guard,
No. 1!

And Edison would stop the horse & startle
Michael & watch until the man himself appeared, wrapped
in his war like a cloak. A big battle meant papers flew out

of our boy’s hands, bad news a homing pigeon
that always returned to him. But the war wasn’t chemistry,
it wasn’t intermediate or even basic telegraphy:

His family had no slaves. His family had no
slaves & nothing would change if the north won.
Our boy wasn’t officer material,

but, one night, when the call didn’t go out,
Edison piped up: Corporal
of the Guard, No.1!

And the words were picked up & passed
to the next man & the next. And the Corporal appeared,
his brows creased & his horse pawing

the dirt, nickering at the soft nag he could smell out there.
Three nights running, our boy shouted into the blissful
dark. But the third night, the dark exploded

with men, teeth and eyes gleaming as ordinance
gleams when it lands at your feet and you stand there,
curiously unharmed. Michael Oates smiled

awkwardly as a soldier caught up
the reins but our boy slid down in the hubbub
and lit out for home.

The soliders followed. The soldiers
followed, determined to shake the boy like a fist
full of dice.

Edison galloped down the cellar stairs, ran
past his locked laboratory, and made for the room
where they kept the foodstuffs.

He knew there was an almost-empty barrel
of potatoes there, having carried up a eye-full
arm-full of soft tubers and reproduced

his mother's soft sigh at things undone
the night before. Edison hefted the barrel
and emptied the last of the potatoes

into the full barrels next to it. He crouched,
pulling the empty cask over his head
and sat in the stinking resinous dark, rotten

rot up his nose while feet tromped
through the cellar, voices
calling out to his father, who’d been eager

for his news of the war, only to have half an armed
regiment in his sitting room, bristling mad.
You’d think he was the enslaving enemy, those soldiers

glowered

so.

(Do I need to say that Samuel aped an overlord
with a switch the next morning, having found our boy
laid out in his bed, stinking, happy?)

Die Himmel erzählen...

Erzählen: to tell.

Predict

Bright azure and white,

patches of gunmetal gray.

The wind— you never know.

Instruct

Take an umbrella.

A jacket, at least.

Recount

Clouds moved in so fast!

The classroom was dark.

Got soaked on the way home.

Declare

Look, it's finally

stopped.

["Die Himmel erzählen": the heavens are telling.]

The third day

Denn er hat Himmel und Erde bekleidet in herrlicher Pracht.

Heaven

Tulips

fill their cups with sunlight.

Earth

Holes dug for daisies,

damp-earth scent released.

Clothed

Impatiens. How many ways are there

to be pink?

Glorious

Evening and morning fragrant

with lily-of-the-valley.

[more quoting from The Creation: "For he hath clothed heaven and earth in glorious splendor."]

watching


he watches through the camera viewfinder,
reduces the fight to cute, harmless –
you miniature, an actor on the screen
throwing a small fist at your opponent
or, perhaps, placing a cookie in her mouth,
letting her pat your face

lens filters blows,
shrunken punches don’t hurt
as much – you, her, him

but he tries again and again to hold you
safe, still, with the pinch of shutter

Learning Curbside

Along the road he found
three pots, large as the one
cracked at home, in need
of serious replacing.
Right there at driveway’s end
left for neighborly scavengers
along with two mismatched
wooden chairs, one green,
one blue and a purple striped
umbrella for a table he hasn’t
made yet. Each piece of trash
turned treasure as he lifted
it into the trunk of his old car,
relocating garden bounty
before the day-late trash truck
made its rounds. This is the way
it works around here, silent offers
sit like school children waiting
for a yellow bus, taking them
away to learn how to be more.

Morning, (vii)

everything in a state
of metamorphosis
..........until it isn't

..........life tasting stale
as day-old bread
an open bottle of wine
i love yous spilled carelessly
last year sometime
.

Night letters #25, 26 Y, Z

why night letters, you ask

I wrote them for you

the one who laughs

for you

the one who mourns

for you

the one who loves

for you

the jealous

and I wrote them

for you, woman cocooned

in folds of blue silk, double-edged

burkha

and for you

the one who hates

and for you

and you 

and you

who just likes 

to read a lifetime

in three simple lines

I write my night letters

tired into late May,

but now I have to leave

you, my words

all, to catch a plane

head out into the wilds

of army and my brain

on overdrive trying to collect

the road to war

in tiny laser raindrops 

goodnight friends, readers

goodnight....

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

that's me for 2009... sorry I couldn't contribute more thoughtful comments, more thoughtful work this year, but most of you know where I am/where I'm going, and juggling home, war and writing is a very tricky thing

best,

sms

billiards, a riel man's game

Gabe was a hustler,
ran the ferry
and the best game in town.

The only pool hall on the prairies.

With a cue, or a rifle,
broke the closely clustered game, shot
them down where he wanted them.

Led a hunt at half the age of most
men who led. Had his first rifle at 10.

The fifth bend in the river is still
his.

Big Gabe and Little Lou.

Gabe named for an angel,
Louis for a king.

When the time
of reckoning came the angel
flew.

The king lost his
crown.

God knows which was
harder to live with,
die with.

And of either man, no direct
descendants survived.

Left corner pocket.
Sink them all.

The Black, the Shining - for Jonathan

i.
the babies are not safe, she says. the crows are attacking bald people. she herself, because of the cancer treatments and hair loss from chemo, is wearing a hat so they will not be tempted. she peers through her backfence, over to ours. clutching a sunbonnet, sweet Joanne, who will die later that summer. she prays for each person in the neighbourhood as she showers each day. her husband jokes he knows what she thinks of him based on what body part she is washing when she names him. the crows flap nervously from our pine tree. i laugh at her supersitions on behalf of the bald. she asks if i heard the shrieking that morning at 5 am. drunken revellers returning home late, children up early on the weekend? no: a balding businessman jogging down the alley on a saturday morning. the crows - swooping. diving. threatening. Joanne, watching from behind gauzed curtains, decided his bald head drew them. irresistable shine, like mr. clean. we abandon our backyard picnic, bald baby on each hip. children scattering alongside, holding their heads. one crow follows us all the way to the house, perch by perch: as the backdoor swings safely shut, arrows back to sentient pine.
ii.
from our front step, watch strangers clutching at heads, waving arms as they run down our street. looking above them, swatting, sometimes crying out. and the crows. their guttural cries. how they triangulate so the victim is always between them. once our corner is passed, they yo-yo back to original posts. shake-kneed victims stumble off kerbs, stop rush hour traffic with crucifix arms and gethsemane faces. inside, the children begin to hope for pedestrians, want to invite friends over, predict traffic accidents, cheer for the birds. i read up on crows.
iii.
a large group of crows: a murder. we look out our window, and see a murder. for neither the first or last time.
iv.
i contact a researcher via the internet, describing the corvid behaviour. he excitedly asks me to videotape it. crows group in families - adults without mates or children will come back to their parents to help raise younger siblings. the four or five regular adults chasing people may be an avian couple with teens, protecting nest or distressed youngster. excitedly i tell my partner.
v.
partner decides to take nest down. children and i protest. would we not do the same were we threatened? we should help them. cotton balls or bearing balls in his ears, he ignores all others, dons welding helmet from days gone by, leather gloves, overalls. steel-toed boots. climbs the pine tree, with a tennis racket in one hand.
vi.
i wish i had a video camera.
vii.
they dive at him half-heartedly as he ascends. he throws the nest to the ground - we are dismayed at how loosely a crow's nest is made. secretly i hope it will not take long to remake. there is nothing inside. the children cheer.
viii.
more screams at dawn. who knew there were so many bald joggers? but even people with hats are attacked. and one boy in particular. the boy across the alley. the boy with the slingshot.
ix.
i see the boy again, aiming into my yard, the crows wheeling around him. his eyes blank and hard as chipped marbles. instinct makes me run out, and there is the victim. slingshot found the mark days ago, this crow can't fly, only jog one broken wing trailing. black shining eyes meet mine. i've solved a murder.
x.
i speak to the boy; his parents; Joanne; my partner. the children run out to see the wounded crow, give him food and water. their father follows and in front of us all, decapitates the crow with a golf club. the last day i ever thought of him as my partner, though more and less would follow, and none of it related. unless crows have malicious ghosts. once a tree fell on him, broke his leg. i had an alibi.
xi.
the crows still live in our pine tree. they cry out if he comes by. memory serves, re-serves.
xii.
i find a crow on my front lawn - his wing is broken. i get a cage from a neighbour, win him in with bread and water, speak peaceably, call the university vet college. he is cared for.

and the crows still live in our pine tree.

The Favorite Present

A little boy who just turned three
is not so much a sleeper
as a sleuth.

Enamored by a TV show where clues
are gathered
in an all important
handy dandy notebook

with a spiral at the top
just big enough to hold a blue crayon,
the boy is emphatic the notebook be
always at hand

or rather tucked in his britches
to use at any moment a clue surfaces.

In a pile of expensive presents
he wades with the small orange
cardboard cover poking from his jeans,
the prize he will not let out of his sight

no matter how the expensive toys
weigh around him and givers implore
his bright eyes for attention.

He pats the stiff surface of the notebook
in satisfied wonder and says again,
“It’s just what I wanted.”

stretch


grab feet, roll chest over knees
until you’re a fist
throbbing with breath,
waiting for heart to slow
its one-two against ribs

pull shoulders apart
across your back,
let every punch you’ve thrown
stream to the floor
pool with sweat from your hair,
and the need to prove
the power of your body

night letters #25 X

exile

never to belong

again, to home, 

to him

Evening, (x)

31 mots au mois de mai:
.
.
je me suis endormie
dans ton jardin
…………………….ce soir
sous la tout petite lune
qui flottait
…………………..là-haut

les étoiles s’amusaient
à jouer………cache-cache
…………parmi les branches
bourgeonnantes

c'était beau
comme un rêve.
.

Candy

After the war
my father was sent
to Germany
for the Occupation.
He used to stand
on the roof of his hotel
throwing
Hershey bars
to the kids
below.

They were abandoned
by the war-makers,
left to roam the streets
for food and friends.
The country was a mystery
to a skinny soldier who
never
had enough to eat
a day in his life

‘til he enlisted.
He could not fathom coming
all this way
and have
food to throw away—
just rain chocolate on folks
who
weeks before
were called mortal enemies
but now stood grounded
in the street—

hands uplifted in hopes
of catching GI rations,

the sweet germ of new truth
falling
in brown wrappers

from a uniformed city boy
who understood hunger.

lesson


your fists buck and rear
the nearer to her face

you have to learn to hit

to watch your glove smash
against forehead like
fender into flesh

have to train to land
a solid shot to the belly –
hard leather echo –
without saying sorry

night letters #24 w

wild cards

no one knows which way this'll go

how he'll be next time 

he sees her, or she him;

ace of diamonds, king of hearts?

a mitt full of jokers, 

now that would be a laugh;

will she club him with her beauty?

will he no-trump her

with ambivalence?

 

and what about that queen of spades, 

what cards does she have left to play

that whining, fucking bitch?

Edisonia: the aches of a candy butcher, ca. 1860

Our boy, having learned to inventory
the everyday, meets two dandies & their slave
as the train pulls from the station in Detroit.

Lazy, tired, the Southerners buy Edison’s round
armful of newspapers & toss them out the window,
instructing the slave to pay the bill.

Our boy brings all the print he’s got,
all of the polite columns with their rumblings
on abolitionists, slavers, lynchings - out the window.

Edison knows enough to play to the crowd
when someone else is paying. Wise sarcastic boy,
next he presents a stack of novels

taller than he is. Out the window. Cracked
hickory nuts, popcorn balls, molasses candy? Out.
His coat, hat, shoes? Out.

And finally his trunk, tied with a rope & dragged
from car to car. It all goes out the window, except the trunk.
The slave pushed that out the back door.

He & Edison watched it settle heavily next
to the tracks. And then the slave paid up,
knowing exactly

how much it cost to free him, what argument
might pick his lock. (The newsprint caught & soared
like smoke or sooty birds

aimed at the heart of the sun.)

Goose woman speaks

I was always long-necked,
thick through the waist, and broody
but being with child
cinched it. Some women knit booties, spend
months learning how to turn
the heel. Others rearrange their spare
rooms, become morbidly interested
in pastels. Me, I yanked out my hair, hank by hank,
lining the crib with the long black stuff.
(By the time baby lifted her hand
to me all she’d find was licks
of down.)

The crib was soft, the crib
was soft, but skin-to-skin is best, they say,
and I was all ruddy, starving skin, feeding
her at all hours, reduced
to dining by the fridge’s dim light those times
she settled. (She seemed to know
when I’d had enough and would rouse,
squawking arms out-thrust.) My hair grew in.
My weight dropped like a wet bird
so her father started bringing home
crumpled take-out bags, the food half-eaten,
or shrunken fruit out of season, the strawberries
wooden, the apples sharp; shoddy groceries
to be sure, but what can you do
when your baby is never further
away from you than the tips
of your outstretched fingers?

I tried to tell him: what’s good
for the goose is good for the gander.
But he learned early that the nine-to-five
was salvation after the dim all-day-all-night
of our rooms. And, if by some trick of the light
he got lonely, all he had to do was stand on Portage,
listen to the sirens and let the wind
have a go at him.

spring

temporarily unavailable...

Evening, (ix)

.
build it and she will come
believes the bowerbird
..........meanwhile
..........you and i
eternally searching for
home.
the roar
of easy laughter
behind
a latched door
a whiff of her of him
a key that fits the hole

outside my window
sparrows sing goodnights
balanced on
branches
so elaborately linked
my eyes can't
....................pull
apart the.knotted.elms
as entwined
as two bowerbirds
at
home
.

Lulled by Downpour

Days of bath warm rain
quilted with thunder
exceed the corners
of flowering beds.

Each herb tucks neatly
to the task of root-reaching—

quiet fingers receive
the drink.

Lavender buds swell
like pale raindrops
on tips of emerald feathers

mounding under late blush iris,
crowding finger buds of scarlet daylilies
making their premier performance.

The calm sound of rain
stitching softly on the roof,
soothes the house—

sews satin ribbons of water
fluttering wet outside
window panes,

and sends sleep
after the lightening
turns down.

The Moment

Rarely do we catch
a leaf fall from a branch,
the moment when before
becomes after. When what’s left
of the baby's umbilical cord
starts to shrivel and shrink,
a rare mushroom we find
on the change table,
a familiar pink knot
in its place.


---
Dear May Dayers,

I think this might be my last post.
Congrats to you all for finding time to do what you love.
Hope to see these poems elsewhere in print soon!

mirror


you’ve only ever used a mirror
to shrug at wayward curls

never primped
powdered
glossed
brushed
blushed
waxed
or tweezed

but now you can’t pass
without switching into stance,
tucking chin, lifting fists,
throwing quick one-twos
at your reflection
until you’re satisfied
with the ridges of muscle
flashing along your arms

night letters #23 V

veil

indigo folds, view the world 

through filigree, I not an I,

me not a me, we just are,

a shadow we; tickle tockle

clock clock over dry stone,

over dry muck streets;

still, I caught you looking-

we have great shoes,

we have great feet-

don't we?

Segmented

In langen Zügen kriecht am Boden das Gewürm.

Imagine the procession, that fifth day,

after all the impressive creatures

the line of moist grey bodies

pulling their segments in, stretching them out,

making for the nearest bit of dirt.

Disappearing one by one.

"You got good soil here,"

says the handyman, digging.

"Lots of worms."

He turns the clods over and there they are,

curled around dandelion roots:

dirt-eaters, leaf-shredders,

tunnel-makers.

Slimy things without eyes.

Vollendet ist das große Werk.

Job done, he waits for pay.

Der Schöpfer sieht's und freuet sich.

Sets down the spade. Says:

"She's ready for planting now."

[Quotations are from Haydn's oratorio The Creation.

In langen... In long procession the worms creep along the earth.

Vollendet... The great work is completed.

Der Schöpfer... The creator sees it and is pleased.

champ


his clippings brittle
on the brick wall
yellow with lamotta, dempsey, louis,
as he checks memberships
in the club where he trained
decades ago, between bouts
north in logging camps

sweatpants over gut
gone soft, three-days’ beard
around his smile, says the same line
every time you walk in
i feel safe now that you’re here
and you forget
how close he’s lived
to blades, fists,
how different that is
from a one-hour boxing lesson

behind the desk
thick fingers blunt
on the small square keys
of a calculator,
shy as he neatens
a stack of bills
in the cashbox,
his writing a shock:
proper and finely-looped
as a schoolteacher’s

how easy he is in the gym,
holding heavy bags,
squeezing his fingers to show
how the glove should square
with a last snap,
using this hands to retell
facts he’s learned
with his body, pass along
stories carried in muscle

and you know it’s only
that his mind can’t make a fist
around your name,
that too many knuckles
have shaken his skull,
rattled brain like a die
loose in a palm,
but you still smile
every time he calls you champ

View Through My Window

After the sky pressed down like a damp quilt
the hidden rain exploded before my eyes,
snagging every leaf twisted up for its wet burst,
clogging new window screens with giant drops.

The tropical downpour predicted for a timid
spring night drenched every dog-walker passing
by the quivering rose hedge, pink blooms laughing
at the soggy fur and soaked sneakers running home.

my owl, my little cabbage, my split pea soup

elle chuchoté comme le vent
qui envolé parmi les fenêtres
et les trouvé toutes fermées


'ton coeur
c'est mon nuit quand je prie
dans ton lit' elle reprendé
les mots saignant
dans l'aube

Evening, (viii)

.
She lies with tired eyes
When the world is asleep
Her toes twinkle to the speed
Of her thoughts

Uncomfortable with the
Idea of endings and beginnings
She can't say if morning
Will come too soon or too late

It is time
That she prays for
Twenty-six hour days
Years that last an eternity

She will run out of time
She worries
Out of time
.................She will run
.

Can't Stand the Heat

Looking down I see a salt necklace
on my red cotton tank, proof of
the broccoli-steaming weather
I dripped through gathering edible jewels
from stalls in the old brick market
by the river, swarming swimming
in it’s own humid stew of home cooks
and bag mules, partners willing
to haul whatever they get to eat

all the hungry week. See fruit rest
in my knife empty hand as I test
the weight of ruby and emerald peppers,
press like a surgeon on avocado possibilities,
bribe the big cheese man with an opal smile
for extra havarti, almost ready to melt
once it comes out of the frigid case
where I’d like to climb inside.

Long after supper, still hot as
Cajun eggplant dressing I sit, wispy
pulled-up hair tickling my neck,
creaky fan blowing soupy night air
behind me, while I sip tropical juice
and coconut rum through a straw
from a cobalt glass full of ice
crammed down between my
breasts, cooling my blood.

night letters #22 U

unformed

despair (there it is again) hiding within the smoke of lilacs, unexpected in late May, when I saw you today, cross the road, enter the store, your dark curls so shiny, your skin so porcelaine (it really is) you've thinned a bit, still, look gorgeous, fit, I followed, ran actually, could not breathe to see you, again, oh my God, it's all been some horrible mistake, these past two years, and it's such a hot, sunny day, your name on my lips, a perfect day to find you, can't wait to phone your father tell him, you're alive, C... I begin,  but it's someone else's daughter, who turns around.

The struggle

The weeds have speed on their side,

a network of tough roots, skinny green runners.

They're going for total takeover.

Creeping charlie travels from lawn to garden,

smothers all in its path.

Weeds with arrowhead leaves

insinuate their roots around

strawberries fighting for a share of sun.

Garden fork turns over big clods

and I shake the earth loose, discard weeds,

dig to loosen a chunk of root. 

Down on hand and knees now,

gloves off, bare fingers

disentangle leaf from leaf.

Must work slowly

or berry plants would come out

with the weeds. This is why

the farmer in the parable says

don't even try it, wait till harvest,

then we'll sort it all out.

I can't wait. This root-by-root, 

stem-by-stem intervention must go on.

The weeds have speed on their side 

and I'm not fast enough.

close


head gentle on shoulder
feel breath through cheekbone, temple
negotiate the embrace
rearrange arms, find
the perfect time and place
to ram fist into ribs

What the tulips say every spring in our nation's capital, because our glorious dead liberated Holland en route to their own graves

two flattened spears
knife up each year
bearing no flower

but in each bulb sown
a switch is thrown
for one neon hour

Morning, (vi)

31 mots au mois de mai :


dans un tout petit jardin
sur la lune où j’habite
je m'occupe dignement de:

…..trois petits pois
…..deux marguerites jaunes
…..une rose rose
…..mille(!) libellules blues qui dansent sur mes pieds
.

heavy bags


each a different, blind, opponent:

old prize fighter,
still hard-muscled in the gut
but face caved, duct-taped

barrel-chested canvas heavyweight
on a flabby comeback,
strong but slow, creaking
on its thick spring

spry black leather
moves loose and eager,
won't let you in close,
but nudges, gutsy,
inside your range



can't throw, won't win
but invincible --
never ache, never tire,
don't double over a fist,
just steadily siphon energy,
store it deep, swaying --
trees in the wind --
an hour after the last punch

afternoon, (viii)

31 words in the month of May:

.

.

The artist child took my hand
dipped it into a pot of green plasticine
and asked me to make him a rose.
I did. The artist child likes his green rose.

.

Working for the Man

Long week long hours,
can’t complain when jobs
fall apart like cheap shoes
and there you stand
barefoot and no where to go.
So you take what you can,
smile while you run
the machines, use all
the protective gear you’ve got
with no illusions of safety.
Ear plugs and plastic glasses
can’t deafen the whoosh
of savings, all your bread,
flushing away,
production numbers falling
right before your eyes,
wondering who’ll be next to go
on their own or just worn
down, worn out, confused
about the gnat-sized details,
retirement feels like melting
ice cream as summer starts.
You leave the plant past midnight
find your still-running ride
at the end of overtime,
baloney moon sitting high,
stars like broken potato chips,
the hot night crickets singing
reminds you of camping
when you were a kid,
when everything
was free.

night letters #21 T

tank or terror or tangerine

I pick 

tangerine,

orange earring, sweet

fruit, sweet juice

delicious as spring,

late May on the prairie,

far from tanks,

far from terror,

far from everything

that hurts,

I taste,

drink,

eat

you,

piece-by-piece,

tangerine.

Court:

To woo and win a lover's hand.

Or, the only way you get rid of them
afterwards.

Way Station for the Heartsick

It seems planets and stars away now,
those summer of love nights, hot to me,
but not so steaming as the camps
with names I couldn’t remember
like distant rivers and bloody hills
the poured out places spoken softly,
me just hearing without questions,
holding leather tan heads close
so they could hear my heart beat
steady, hushing them asleep
with primal mother’s music
way before my body used the recipe
for baby making, I could rock
other mother’s sons to sleep,
keep watch without weapons
keep incoming rockets outside
the trembling perimeter
make stateside nights bearable
until dawn rose with streetcars
clanging faintly, city pigeons cooing
on the fire escape and no smell
of jungle rot, no days to count
down, already landed, halfway home,
startled to find a round-eyed woman
wrapped like camouflage
around sinewy solider limbs
blending another hot morning
into how it was before.

lapse


focus threadbare,
tattered by every punch
you’ve taken to the face

through gaps
you see past
your opponent,
beyond the ring:
empty chair
beside your husband,
the beer in his hand
waiting to be pulled
hard down your throat

night letters #20 S

sure she's your friend, 

she cooks dinner,

plays tennis, 

watches movies,

swims, 

drinks my best with you,

helps with my kids,

I'm grateful,

all women need wives,

especially when they work 

out of town,

but would you mind

asking if next time

she wouldn't leave her hairdresser's card

under my bed, 

or her kimono

lying around?

Plum Blossoms

For two weeks, the street fleets
with pink blossoms, clustered petticoats,
a line of chorus girls kicking their skirts
overhead. Branches stacked with marshmallow globes,
leisure suit’s disco balls. Cumulus clouds
that open into thunderheads, the pom-poms
of boutonnieres and cheerleaders letting you know
what you had hoped for has arrived.
How grateful am I to those
who planted these trees sixty years ago,
not knowing who they planted them for.


---
A brand new poem, as in 53 minutes old!
Cherry or plum blossoms. Any ideas how to tell them apart. These trees bloomed late and had huge pink clusters. Thoughts?

One night in June

An evening of poetry with Sharon Caseburg & Ariel Gordon
Where: Aqua Books, 274 Garry Street
When: Thursday, June 4, 7:00 pm

Please join Sharon & Ariel and their guests Tim Schouten and Neil Besner as they launch chapbooks from presses in Edmonton, Saskatoon, and Montreal.

In addition to the readings, the event will feature visual art by Tim Schouten [whose artwork "Untitled #117 (In the Absence of Horses)" is the cover of Guidelines] and Debbie Caseburg Tyson.

There will ALSO be one of EAT! Bistro's splendid cakes!

* * *

The Books

Ariel Gordon’s Guidelines: Malaysia & Indonesia, 1999 (Rubicon Press), explores what it means to ground oneself in landscape and family. These prose poems vividly chronicle the journey undertaken by two sisters to reconcile with their family’s past, and, over the course of their travels, with each other. A truly beautiful collection by a talented writer, this chapbook strikes a delicate balance between understanding the past and moving forward with strength into the future.

sleepwalking - poetry by Sharon Caseburg, jacket design and handwork by Debbie Caseburg Tyson - is a long elegy, elegant and other-worldly, wrapped in silk. Published by JackPine Press.

Rutting Season, published by Montreal’s Buffalo Runs Press, is an engaging and accessible mini-anthology that features the poetry of three fresh voices in Canadian poetry and places these poets into a critical conversation with each other. Ariel Gordon, Michael Lithgow, and Linda Besner put their heads together in this unique collection.

* * *

Poet Biographies

Sharon Caseburg is a Winnipeg-based writer, editor and book designer who splits her time between producing other people’s books and writing her own. Her poetry and critical writing have appeared in numerous Canadian publications.

Ariel Gordon is a Winnipeg-based writer and editor. Her poetry has recently appeared in fine lit mags such as Carousel, QWERTY, and PRISM International and even circulated on buses in Manitoba and Alberta. After a handmade limited-edition chapbook with Kingsville’s Palimpsest Press sold out in fall 2008, Ariel's first full collection of poetry, Hump, is slated for publication with Palimpsest in spring 2010.

* * *

Artist Biographies

Debbie Caseburg Tyson is an Edmonton-based fibre artist and instructor who indulges her passion for colour and texture in both contemporary quilt art and embroidery disciplines. Her work resides nationally in both private and public collections.

Tim Schouten is a Winnipeg based artist who maintains a studio on his ranch near Petersfield, Manitoba where he lives with his wife, dogs and five horses. He has shown his work in solo and group exhibitions in Canada and the U.S. and his work can be found in private, corporate and public collections.

Leg up: an inadequate elegy

What words? Good ones:

He gently boosted the established, or nouveau
up and comers
a gentle critic to build, and warm;
clean or correct.

A sculptor: pulled out merits,
assessed flaws. Of good judgement.
Trusted. For his talent, lived
from cheque to cheque.

When he went missing they didn't talk about
his book of poetry. Instead they
dragged the river. And should it be needed,
this item saved for the obituary.

But he would emerge, as a poet,
when he chose to emerge.
Three weeks later. Floating to the shore.
Dead stars in his eyes. Thumbs up.

Charlie Brown's Teacher

Even those who don’t know the reference
imitate the algebra drone,
the wah wah wah wah,
as they plunger mute their ears.

Stoppered slide of a trombone
that blots out dates and chalk,
my mother’s voice on the phone.
Failing to hear the variables
of her day, then wanting her to share more.

But how can she, if I can’t remember
her insomnia, new haircut, the surface offerings
that might have opened into something
and didn’t when I was wah wah wah wah,
not listening.

Sacrament of Me - first draft

Late summer in ‘69 was just as groovy
as they say it was, flowers in the hair,
free love down in Union Square,
cheap strawberry-tasting wine everywhere,
waves of patchouli streaming like crepe paper
off longhaired Midwestern girls migrating
west see the ocean and smell sourdough.

All you who came after, all you hearing me
will just have to believe I’m too laid back
even now to lie about a funky hilly city
full of dreamers and wounded warriors
passing by the Presidio on their return,
where some of us found each other,
found ways to heal what had been hit,
feed what was starving, reach inside
to the wet place of connection –

the ancient joining, bodies remember
over wars over doubts about our names,
what piece of land spit us out,
how any of us came away whole.

Found the miracle of altars below our guts,
where we entered with no ID no check points
entered again and again, hard then harder
until we polished the halo of life
around our blown open soul-holes,

reaching deep into another live body,
the gentle way humans can touch,
should touch, fearless skin too tan,
without fundamental sin – those lies –

simply reaching into sweet living folds
around healthy blood right under skin,
blood that stays inside like it should, no
nightmare ambushing your sleep—

no bamboo spikes poisoned with shit
will pierce you or your buddies as you fall
into pits no one sees in the damp dark
jungle maze, where approaching women
will not wrap grenades in baby blankets
next to a real live not-a-doll baby

shoot, Tommy, shoot!
I can only hold tighter—

before the memory takes another son, a father
nowhere near home but further into that hell
we all knew was DC’s dirty trick on everyone.

The ones who came back, made it back at all,
hands tainted by jungle mold,
hungry for who they lost
usually themselves most of all,
needed every kind morsel I could muster
to feed them back their own souls, kiss them

sweet and deep, fuck the death off of them
until they moaned past the tears, lost in wet nights
spent surrounded hiding in rice paddies

dead bodies night-bumping, floating like ducks
in yellow dawn, waiting for Charlie to move
on, yeah those boys would sit right up and holler
at night, sweat soaking flowered sheets in my bed,
the only temple I could give them for divining
the path home, offer up the sacrament of me

as often as it took to get them straight, sleep pure
and believe it was OK to sit at their mama’s table,
head back to a horse ranch, go back to the pretty girl
they had in their wallet, cleaner now,
dipped beneath their own river Jordan,
and returned to the fold, it was OK.

They needed me to be who they needed me to be,
and it was my gift to give, holding their stories
in my body once they passed through the city
calling me to do my sacred duty.

quiet


stunned hush
of a hundred people
unsure of women
in the ring

silent and squeamish
as if watching
a chess match,
surgery, still life
hanging in a gallery

they called for blood
last fight, now fidget
between quiet sips
of beer, wince
at every scoring fist

Morning, (v)

.
he left his morning coffee
on the table where i sip
staring at his cup
unstirred

sun pours through
the kitchen window
left open by him
before he disappeared
into his life
again

there were no warnings
no signs that he might
slip away

.......i try to remember
what I told myself
I wouldn't forget
next time




the sun
moves on and
the steam on his
morning coffee
clears
..

night letters #19 R

if metal rain caused blossoms

then desert birds would sing

again

Palm warbler

Thanks!

Pressing Deadlines

shouldbemorelikepressingflowersinacatalogue.
pickybutenjoyable orlikecreasesinpolyester
slacks canyoustillget
those theymaybe
onethingevenrarerthanan
unpressingdeadline






:)

Madigan General 1970

In the spidery one-story hospital with wings
laid out to avoid total destruction
if bombed by planes from the Rising Sun ,

war wounded and dependents shared
a splayed structure left over from WWII
smack between Army and Air Force bases

beneath the distant peak of Mt. Rainer
close enough to the Pacific so boys
could be flown straight from Vietnam –

that’s where my sweet boy was born
first dancing his tiny feet on the planet,
hands waving like a mad conductor,

sugar voice already singing candy.
Outside I held him in my milky arms
held him up to the lights-out night sky

and promised that this one
would be a warrior for peace,
this one would question orders,

this one would be in the battalion
of creation, be the lead singer screaming
come together and never know shrapnel

beneath his skin, never see bodies fly
through rice paddies or pick up pieces
of his buddies for Nixon’s sake.

It was all I knew then, all the vow I prayed
after fucking the life back into his teenage father
when he came back all caked in death

three Purple Hearts in velvet cases
while his own kept bleeding tears
when he picked at his crying guitar.

tired


deep in the last round,
shoulders rotten with punches,
ache festering in arms,
you quarantine fatigue
in muscle, lungs,
let body fend
fight to keep mind
pure, oblivious
to tiredness massing below

night Letters #18 Q

ق

qaf

the beginning of pen;

write a letter, 

write a letter to her, 

write a letter to him;  

write rings of mountains, 

write lapus,  

write poppies in bloom;  

write the four chambers, 

your aorta, 

write veins, write blood;  

write rose petals,  

pomegranate,  

write black storks’ return;  

write all of it, 

write sand, worry, 

celebration;  

write despair.

Morning, (iv)

.
hope casts a shadow
on all things certain;
did you see the lily bloom?
.

Album

And this is the pantry shelf:

twelve quarts of peaches,

seven pints of plums,

six pints of salsa.

Half-pints of jam, jelly:

strawberry, apricot, chokecherry.

A good shot, I think—

the contrasting colors,

the shine of the jars.

Most of it's gone now.

Last jar of peaches just emptied;

only apricot jam left (nobody's favorite).

Berries will come first. Then apricots,

peaches, plums, tomatoes.

Ritual of filling the canner, bathing the jars

with boiling water. Lids hot, syrup bubbling.

All the precautions against a faulty seal

letting in deadly spores.

Steam jostling the canner lid.

Kitchen sticky with fruit.

Bright sweetness preserved,

made to disappear.

Last Call

Between the chorus of hurried humming cars
slinging themselves around the curve
and lullabies of goodnight birds
with bellies full of my tossed bread,
I know the lavender sky is bluing into
the navy curtain that passes for black.
Stage lights will fade out faster.
Sequined stars will appear
and only the tweets from trees,
droning tires and aerobic footsteps
will carry on the story of evening.

hunger


just a few minutes of sparring,
enough to punch a hole
in your gut
the size of a loaf of bread,
a hunger that jabs all day

night Letters #17 P

phosphorus

white phosphorus

flashing night sky,

in the desert wild dogs'

pupils wide,

burnt brilliance of metal, 

of chemical,

while children lie

a thousand years sleeping

for roses,  for pomegranates,

for black storks to arrive.

How to Write a Poem

“Step #12: Get opinions. It can be hard to critique your own work, so after you've done an initial edit, try to get some friends or a poetry group (there are plenty online) to look at your poem for you.” – wikiHow, How to Write a Poem.

1.
Write about what terrifies you but, um, wait until mum or dad is dead to do it. For the family’s sake…

2.
Take all the punctuation out of your poem.

3.
Your lover should be your first reader and your subject, but know this: having good sex is hard. Writing good sex is harder. Believing someone who just had their head between your legs – even if they’re a hardcore critic – impossible.

4.
No one needs your next poem.
(Everyone needs your next goddamn poem.)

5.
If writing rhyming poetry about God from jail, realize you’ve hit the trifecta. Celebrate by centering everything on the hard drive that's not porn.

6.
capital letters are for suckers. seersuckers. sapsuckers.

7.
Also: use the page. Engage the ear. Allude to classical texts, sneak in a few impeccable pop culture references. Break the line. Break a leg. Consider and re-consider sex, love, death. Have a firm grasp of grammar and syntax but also have something on the side with the fragment. Form should follow content but, hopefully, not stalker-close. Cause, you know, that's not write.

8.
Put the punctuation back in.

9.
Don’t write poems about writing poems.
Oh. Shit.

She was no Victoria

this faded sepia woman
in full regalia. Sunlight-stained photo

a gravemarker
anyone can see

you existed in
two worlds. You loved well

in both, but lived well

in neither.

The only thing you would never stop wanting:

his arms at night. His snore.

What you would remember:

the times you feigned sleep.

He loved to watch you

brush your hair.

This picture says you lived to see your children and grand-children

walk down a hundred paths paved with bad intentions.

You faced down the fear of lighting your fire at night,

because every scenario brought a wolf. It says you grew

wider, wilder, wiser, wished

for death.

The first winter after the soldiers left for their home, yours still smoking -
that winter your youngest child named for the father

he never saw

froze to death in his sister's arms. That night you had snared
a winter-thin jackrabbit. You didn't
cry.

Skinning the rabbit was

like undressing an unruly child in too-tight clothes.

You have a scar still on your hand. Just there.

You were the rabbit and the snare.

Beneath wolfwillow you dug a hole

buried your own tongue, mermaid of

the plains.

When the bush was cut down, an entire world in the roots.
Sweep the sky clean.

afternoon, (vii)

.
Mémère would have called it ominous,
the dead sapsucker I found
on your doorstep that day.
.....Yet, how beautiful it was,
.....cloaked in its orange and black
.....and white feathers, its tiny
.....bird feet turned toward
.....the sun-filled sky.
.

Relocation

The determined jade plant grows
past its tiny pot.
Thick waxy leaves
reach downward –

arching stems droop
like a weeping willow’s
silk strung silhouette, yet

with so much flesh from
so little moisture in its form.
Leaning on a plain white wall

beneath a southern window,
dance-like long-limbed shadows
double its true mass,

hint at fluid movement.
The shiny green top-heavy succulent
defies thinning laws of gravity,

daring the round terracotta limits
to hold still whatever passes
for jade feet, all ready to step out

and find more suitable
accommodations.

throat


focus on throat –
twinned ridges flicker
with every strained breath

read your range,
her next punch,
in the shadow of clavicle

can’t look at her fists,
can’t follow one
without seeing the other
too late, only when
leather dries cornea

can’t let gaze stray
near her eyes without losing
point of view – remote, objective –
your strength, drive,
pulled under, sunk, by her own

lock sight on throat, throw
six inches north or south,
see nose, ribs, only through your gloves,
watch neck thicken
to swallow, collar heave

night Letters #16 O

oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no...

I read your words this morning,

two years have almost passed;

could you not have foreseen?

it was all there in every word you wrote: 

the foundering; the hurricane; 

the broken ship;

you, slipped from our harbour.

I read your words,

this endless mourning.

afternoon, (vi)

.l’homme orange - 3ième partie


je dessine mon cœur sur
un bout de papier,

c’est pour toi, je murmure en coulant

égratigné en forme de lettres
il est là en rouge saignant

c’est trop pesant, tu me dis.

je reprends mon papier
je corrige mon échec et maintenant

tu souris, en voyant mon cœur violet.
.

Morning Flight Plan

The night before
the exhibit closes
I remember

and decide to dash
after quick coffee,
on the last day,

see the collection –
Ming dynasty treasures

travelled from
the earth’s flip side,
fluttering here like

migrating butterflies.
I must catch a glimpse
of such fleeting color

before it escapes,
this one chance
to witness a time and place

no wings of mine
will ever touch.

afterwards, the fireworks

temporarily unavailable

night Letters #15 N

night words

for you to keep

secret, hidden little a's

to z's, just like the box

grandpa buried beneath the seat

of his '39 Ford, filled

with french letters.

warm


you can’t let the damp of your t-shirt cool,
sweat dry at the base of your spine,
waiting for your turn in the ring

must move – constantly prod muscle
like keeping a concussion awake

bully the mirror with half-punches,
fingers flying out, fist in full bloom

taunt, quick shift of weight – forward, back,
rev, ready, but hovering over the gas

afternoon, (v)

marjo's meal:
.
I pick the one ripe avocado
nearly black in a sea of grassy greens

I squeeze, salivate this timely promise,
the taste of fruit and nut as
smooth as butter on my tongue

I will serve it on a bed of green leaves
dappled with kumquat, sliced blackberries,
black peppercorns, crushed

I will baptize it in balsamic vinaigrette
and feast on the small true pleasure
that life affords me today.
.

Quitting Time

Every mouthful of food in our house
came by way of welding sparks
thrown off on the line as cars
came rolling from hell pits.
Daddies stood along the line
wearing heavy hot hoods
catching pretty sparks, burning
through overalls leaving lace patterns
on t-shirts, singed eyebrows
and thirst, every family’s meal earned.
Today I heard, after the silent
factory hush, at least a quarter
of the dealerships will fall away
like clipped toenails
and I worry about the milk
gone from some other little girl’s table.

reason


you have no reason
to be in the ring –
no score to settle with your body,
nothing to prove through fists

no child to inspire, no snub to avenge

boxing is not symbolic
of a larger fear, no dread
to conquer other than brain
bouncing inside skull
like balloon off palm

no dream of blood on your gloves,
eyes stuffed with bruise

you watched documentaries
on ali for the poetry,
raging bull on a de niro kick

satisfaction in a clean, deliberate hit
to her face, neat weave
from her rebuttal, but never joy

adrenalin snuffed, aching
every time you turn in bed,
you try to find a rationale
strong enough to quell doubts,
to see you through tomorrow’s rounds,
anything more significant
than for the hell of it

Dramatically Incorrect

the sandals the serpents the sabres

loving the living
leaving the dying

the bruised the bleeding the broken

these things tear the gauze from
Gaza's Strip

introduce the waiting
to Kuwait

put the I in Iraq, Iran,
iPhone

next year, in Jerusalem

night Letters #14 M

maybe 

you will read my night letters

between the lines, that the willow

will still be there next time

I walk your fields, only then

it will have leafed, softened

into a not so secret place,

only then it will have opened,

finally it will be mine.

Cormorant

An oil slick apparition, silent V
that skims the highway till one
gets sucker punched onto asphalt by a semi.

Its long neck extended, wings flap for purchase
on the dotted yellow. I swerve and still
the right tire connects, hits feather, trips bone.

I open my mouth and squall.
The car rocked by traffic speeding past.

Already, the mind at work, distancing.
So this is how it happens. All the roadkill
we pass on the way to work
and try to resurrect back to skunk, cat.

Try to shirk our claim in we, in accident.
But it doesn’t work. Every black shape a trigger.
Windshield wipers, bent umbrellas
sprout primaries on top of garbage cans.

Black feathers rise up to join the flock, fall
on the cars that come after.

Evening, (vii)

A Walk on the Prairies

.
over ancient land
that whispers
a thousand stories
I walk
..........and with
every step I hear
the song of
mémère's first
footfalls on the
rich prairie soil.

I keep my pace
in time with hers
and through time
and time again
we walk this land
together tied
in yesterday and
..........tomorrow.

to the drum of a
distant history
hand in hand
..........we walk
you and I.
.

Smoky

"white rabbit white rabbit" makes it drift the other
way. like saying "i love you" to someone who's not
ready.

shift the coal, stir the ashes.
back off or move sideways
when it gets too hot.

pulsing long-distant stars,
heat-rippled embers:
how little difference there is -only
proximity.

Hermit Crabs

Stuffed into shells they’ve outgrown,
their soft bellies hang out like beer guts,
as they wait for better real estate.
But the next-size up,
the cream-coloured dog whelks,
have all been pocketed, serve time
on bathroom shelves.
While the hermit crabs hide
under barnacle-crusted rocks,
brandishing their one big claw
like a man with a cane
trying to defend himself.

Putting Plants to Bed

In the rushed hours of evening
when the dogs walk their people
and a snake of cars writhes
up the street heading home

I dig into last year’s weedy pots.
Old roots ripped from friable soil
suitable for baby plants,
storm watered, homeless
wailing for a hole of their own.

I made a dirty mess of it all.

White root threads wrapped
around each black block of dirt

just a tickle away from reaching
into fresh crumbly loam
and stretching out for the summer

sending blooms or fragrance
to attract tiny fast birds
repel stinging insects
or flavor sauces.

It’s all a Pollock jumble of color
drizzled in budding marigolds
and alert verbena, scarlet salvia
and velvety catnip.

Edisonia: a stick of phosphorus, ca. 1862

1.
Our boy sits content amidst the glass
of his on-board lab, the soft lead of his printing
press, his perishable inventory, watching the pine flare
of the stretch between Detroit
& Port Huron at speed.

He forgets that to ride a train with its rattles
& jerks is to walk a tightrope – possible, with practice,
but not without its pains. He has learned to sway
but not what it is to lean out over
the precipice, until a poorly-laid piece
of track takes the risk for him, bucking the train long
enough that a stick of phosphorus – expensive,
incandescent stuff – jolts from its shelf
& lights it all up.

Edison stares. He stares
& then begins to stamp & beat at his beautiful fire,
and is singed but singing a little inside
How very curious!
when the rail-thin conductor appears.


2.
Outside his compartment, Edison’s digs
are an open secret, an affair the conductor
condones as long as his cheek
is larded with stick candy & his wife
gets her wholesale blackberries & butter.

But a fire? Smoke stealing under the door
& shouting down the rocking hallway:
Panic! Mayhem! Hysteria!
Then the conductor is dutifully, rightly
righteous, bursting through the door with a bucket
full to the brim & putting the fire out
before beginning to shout:

Wretched!
Boy!
BURNING!
My!
Train! !!

But the conductor is not a hasty man: he waits
until the train has groaned
to a halt
at the next hamlet
before he pitches it all out:

Test tubes, vials, jars, boxes, small
ingenious shelves, various apparatus,
treatises on chemistry whose underlined passages
gleam from white pages as they careen
out the back door,

Clumps of whiskery onions & bunches
of carrots that fly like quoits,

Bushel baskets of dusty local plums, smaller
containers of strawberries that drop
like periods at the end
of suitably dramatic sentences.

(BURNING!
My!
Train!)

Charred bundles of the Detroit Free Press,
tied with string in a way that is most
satisfying, what inflammatory periodicals
didn’t burn,

What butter hasn’t already melted,

And the arms & legs, right angles & musky
softnesses of a deeply chagrined
young man.


3.
Our boy on the tracks, amidst shards
of glass and co-mingled chemicals, half the alphabet
scattered between his legs, watches a flare of exertion
settle into the pale anger of the conductor
who must next write a report of the incident
for his superiors at the end
of the line.

As the train pulls away, leaving Edison
halfway home and the earnings
of the past year unhinged
& twisted around him, he conceives
of an experiment where a downcast
boy whimpers
when subjected to fire:

Eureka!


4.
The train picking up steam, the car empty
of Edisonia, the conductor stomps
away, wishing for a cup of tea & the clean sheets
of his policy manual:

Smoking compartment indeed!

sweat


heavy bag sways, waits patient
as you blot forehead on sleeve
but in the ring you breathe
and swallow sweat, blink, wince
at the sting – one swipe
to dry your face, clear your eyes
lifts arm, shifts focus,
asks her to hammer
a fist into your ribs

oh, by the way

(I would perfectly understand if you are wondering just who this Curiousity and Joy fellow is. My name is Kevin Hehir and I live in St. John's. I haven't always lived in St. John's, there were stints in such lovely prairie places as Winnipeg, Belmont, Yorkton, S'toon, and Candle Lake. This provenance got me friendly with Branda Schmidt on whose facebook page I met Andie who suggested that I get into this May Day Project. I hadn't written a poem in 2 years (some may say I still haven't) and I'm going to use this project to unstog the jam seems to have coagulated at the same time as my first child arrived. I'll try and get five out before the end of the month. Thanks for having me!)

Going north

in truth I went because you conned

me into loving then left

I needed a job (a damned good reason)

far away from you in the Caribbean

or at least that’s what I’d like to say

in truth Whitehorse was the only place

that’d take this cub

besides I always wanted to go up

and so this is me

memoir

this is my memory of flight

my fall and flight fall and flight

I’m like a refugee persecuted

by you for my allegiance to

a sun God I tried to get close

more than once and each time

you melted my wings

then destroyed all the feathers

in the world so I couldn’t

try again you would have

demolished me too

but I ran

in truth what’s important

is I cannot can’t cant kant

stop loving you

I’m going to try

to forget you

and pretend I’m not sorry

though life’s not pointing

in the direction I thought