songanddancegirl

LOVERS

LOVERS  IN  A  DANGEROUS     TIME

They are so wrapped up in each other  blue smoke

rises from their heads  Once separate   now fused

a  participation mystique  

In the news  a couple married 88 yrs.   The old

groom reports:  I always keep a hand on her knee

Another warrior of a 75 yr. union said:  I make sure

to keep a piece of my Chapati for him 

Yesterday my 3rd husband baited me: Who was your

2nd funniest husband?   Unbaitable   I did not answer

Likely  I have not married him yet

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Winter 2013   *inspired by: Embracing Figures With Blue Patina Otto Guttfreund 1913

STEEL

FEEL  LIKE  MY  SOUL  HAS  TURNED    TO  STEEL*

2 girls skipped down the street today   protesting

our grey pre-winter mortis  Looked like they would

careen into sad Canadians   20 somethings   blonde

& coated in sheep  Now stop to light smokes  Giddiness

transformed to hip   with the flick of Bics

Today the anniversary of Sandyhook’s slaughter   20 who

will never cavort except in the emptiness of late afternoon

When parents forget   then remember   then forget to

remember

The shooter   also 20   shot his mother in the head 6x with

her own gun   He hadn’t left the house in 4 months    Since

then  there has been the Boston Marathon bombing   the Navy

Yard shooting   & each day in the U.S.   82 have died of gunshot

wounds

Recently in a Sand-tray session a 20 yr. old man placed a robot

near a breastfeeding Mary   Was he hungry? Curious? Murderous?

Like the shooter   crouching in the shadows by his mother’s bed

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(Sand-tray Therapy: Jungian psychotherapeutic modality utilizing

figurines in sand as part of the healing process)

Winter  2013     *Bob Dylan  Not Dark Yet  1997

LONELINESS

LONELINESS  LONELINESS

Hate hate   Love love   Loneliness cannot

be turned into a verb (go ahead & try)  It is

a stand alone noun   The lonely feeling will

alert you    You are about to become prey

Too close to the perimeter of the group

Social animals used to rely on one another

to survive   Loneliness meters now broken

Irreparably mutated by the Vollmer M35

and social media technology   We all live on

the periphery of the tribe

A new kind of post-industrial anomie   Prey

to loneliness   and 12 yr. old home grown

terrorists   Though loneliness trumps alcoholism

smoking and obesity   40% of Americans   (especially bartenders)

die of loneliness each year

Loneliness is not depression   which should be

treated by  a professional   There is no treatment

for loneliness  But there is an  APP  simulating the crowd

Beware   this will only confuse your fight/flight instinct

& you will loneliness yourself to death

Pandora Mclean-Hoover clinical social worker in

Pano Texas   cautions: Feelings of loneliness will

not go away on their own   Go to a bar & talk to

a bartender (Globe & Mail November 2013)

Or just be still   in the dying days of our tribal

consciousness   and you may hear   the last laugh   reverberating

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Late Fall   2013

Please Give

PLEASE  GIVE  AS  MUCH  AS  YOU  POSSIBLY  CAN

Yesterday 3 men gave me $20    2 in a restaurant

1 in a shoe store   My book seemed the reason for

the largesse    All 3 were Italian  & amorous   The 3rd

sold me a pair of shoes made in Italy

One man was smooth & hard all at once   one was doleful

the other earnest    Today no one has approached with

money   though I wish someone would

It is late Fall   crisp & sunny   and I am receiving sidelong

glances   My Italian shoes are dust magnets   and a lack of

sleep has corroded parts of me    generating a well hammered

exhaustion     One dream will have to be removed surgically

A black market has sprung up for my book   and a committee

struck to explore the enforcement of:  sleep   happiness   &

suave Italian men    I am especially encouraged by this   development

Fall  2013

SHAKE

SHAKE  YOUR    MEANING-MAKER

I am aware that you have come to expect

meaning  from me   No 1/2 way crucifixions

You want the words nailed-down   Yet it was

Picasso who railed  at being nailed  to the wall

And I do want to satisfy you   But sometimes

meaning is muddy   and I have not crawled this

far to be your meaning-maker   modern Sapien

Meaning is a relatively new gene variant in Homo erectus

We used to be able to tolerate not-knowing   some 1.6

billion yrs. ago   Genetically predisposed to spot danger

we now struggle to see angry faces in the botoxed crowd

You wear your mortality like a bullseye  under a sky of cosmic

blue   where the clouds are moaning  over you   And like our

newest planet   PSOJ318.5-22    (no poets at NASA)   which does

not orbit a star    you have been cast adrift   in a world with a

serious shortage of  silence

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Fall  2013

ZOO

ZOO  OF  THE    HUMAN

The entomologist Renzo Perissinotto

has had a new species of Scarab Beetle

named for him (G.perissinottoi)   Sacred

in ancient Egypt  their images were imprinted

on amulets & funerary objects  A recent study

found that Scarabs mate  quick & dirty  with just

about any bug around

While 64% of Canadian students (age 18-24) said

they’d had a sexual encounter in the past year

without any method of birth control   Sexual health

expert Blondie Chaplain said:  There are gaps in knowledge  for sure     

A more interesting observation is that regarding the

Higgs boson:  Primary particles are almost all the same  it’s

just their juxtaposition that makes your flesh flesh  and wood   wood

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Late Fall   2013

HOG

HOG  TOWN

A frigid wind whips up my    pant-leg

Where are those tiny vagabonds  of

Summer?  Shrieking   simulating sex

and unspeakable acts of violence

*as witnessed by poet   Philosopher’s Walk U of T

Summer camp in down-town T.O.  gone

terribly wrong    Now warehoused in

schools   Un-holy little havoc wreakers

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* Marc & Craig Kielburger (Free The Children)

encouraged parents to choose peaceful Halloween

heroes this year. Reportedly Toronto children in huge

numbers  went out as Mayor Ford   and he as a T.O. Maple Leaf

Late Fall  2013

MELANCHOLY

MELANCHOLY  MAMMAL  LULLABIES

Today a 100 yr. old tree came crashing down in

the park   & the crack addled Mayor was caught

on video   Last night at a Halloween party a 90 yr.

old wore a T-shirt: 2nd virginal birth  Her sister said:      It’s a boy!

More and more the centre is imploding   as rough

magistrates & Prime Ministers    clamour to be    re-born

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*small brain  large face tucked below braincase   rounded

cranial vault   small brow ridges   no capacity for art   symbolic

thought  or full blown language   this creature lived 1.8 million

years ago 

Fall  2013

BIRD BREATH

BIRD  BREATH    AND BEE  STING

square suburban yard   in the vinyl

swimming pool   lightening overhead

groundhogs tremble in bushes before

attacking youngest brother    father never

believed him  but the rest of us do

other brother stung repeatedly  fell into verdant

ravine  one day late spring    mother & neighbour

mother carry him to local doctor   who loves

mother’s best friend

older brother waits for us  menacingly    we who

have plucked every flower on street for Mother’s

Day   police catch baby bro  chubby legs  too slow

friend asks why we stole the dinkytoys      because we wanted them!

blood-red cardinal falls from tree & shivers in the snow   as

boat-loads of freedom from childhood melodramas    wing their way

but haven’t arrived just yet

—

Late Fall 2013

JOHNNY PRESBYTERIAN

JOHNNY  PRESBYTERIAN   A’INT   ROTTEN

I sat at a table today  next to the  Early Instrument Collection

intrigued by the 18th C  leather-bound serpent-horns   But

more so by a threadbare  smallish man    Big shoes  bigger

than his feet   Well kept dishevelment  likely frayed since birth

His not unkind eyes settled on mine    He said: My sister’s husband

beats her every night   Geyser tears shooting out  hit my nose & chin

Too smitten to wipe them  I smiled doe-like in the mist   He said:

Miss  I am Johnny Presbyterian  & I believe we all start as miracles and

end up changing tires    I couldn’t disagree with him

I said:  Johnny if I make something beautiful  will you think it’s beautiful

too?   He handed me one of his boat-like shoes   Take it Miss fer when

begging bowls grow scarce   and lame dogs walk on water

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Late Fall  2013