songanddancegirl

the real wasteland

i came to a flat + desolate space  there was

a shed where festivities took place  filled with

china + x mas dinner  valentine’s day conflated

with st. nick   hermes weeping for my captivity

carltoncarded   largely disregarded   100 yr. old

birthday celebrant in roses+pinks  slept long and

often  dreaming of the homestead   a dirtfloor farm

house  where life was rife with life +death

so what can we say about the day?

needed tequila restoria   pot-oil transmutation gloria

and as i flew home over the frozenprairie  i thought the

serialkiller guy beside me  may have spiked my drink  his

left middle finger  on my mainvein  all the way to thunder bay

__

..and april is the cruellest month..

Spring 2019

ashes to

tell

me

about

that

ring

he asks   for the umpteeeeenth time

it’s a broken heart

sometimes a broken heart is just a broken heart

he continues

cause he’s so smart

aren’t all broken hearts the same in their brokenness?

no they are not

my own reeking of an old maritalcorpse  diamonds glinting

i wear grief on my middle finger  more easily presented

to the griefdeniers   unholypacifiers   +fools

we’ll give u 3 to 6 months  then we’ll drag u to bellevue

another said:    fake it til u make it

so what scares u more

my grief

or my strength?

__

Spring 2019

..in the matter of my own ashes..

scatter them in the ravine behind 52 Purdon..

at Marty’s tree UCC    at Lee’s grave..

and at the munk school reflecting pool u of t

bits of me  colourful outfits  loads of silver  where

i sat for 12 years  writing depressing poems

almost invisible

but not quite..

..some deaths , they explain, will never simply be “gotten over.”

..some mourners will never quite again “be themselves.”

(David Chariandy   Brother   ..on complicated grief  2017)