Mourning Moon

Mourning Moon

autumn’s close

winter’s beginning

a luminous full moon

ample with assertion

it is the time of fruition

the perfect time to let go

of all that weighs on you

&

value the fertility of gratitude

autumn’s goodbye

winter’s introduction

a radiant abundant moon

the mourning moon

it rises for your serenity

**

On this day, one year ago, it was the last time I’d see my father alive. I went to his house after work with my niece and had a quiet cup of tea with my step-mom. We almost hadn’t gone as she told us he wasn’t doing so well during the daytime but changed her mind. I was always glad she did otherwise I’d never have gotten to say one last I love you.  Chelsey and I left the apartment and had a somber dinner together before we both went home and fell into our beds, feeling the deepest weight of sadness.

At the time, my cellphone was on 24/7 and that night before I went to bed I changed my ringtone to something that would be loud enough to jar me out of my sleep if it could even find me: Billy Idol’s ‘Dancing With Myself’.  I had just succumbed to a light sleep before Billy was wrestling me from it well into the early hours of November 27th. The news I feared would come any minute. He was gone.

One year today was the last time I saw my Dad alive. It has been a year of confusion and heartbreak and bereavement but in all of that I have held tight to the happiness he brought to my 40 odd years on this planet. That kept me going, the good memories of which there are many. I still miss him, with every fiber of my being. I wish I could call him up, have him yell at me, bark at me, anything: just one more time.

Today, one year later to the day of the last time I saw my Dad breathing, there will be a full moon. Not just an ordinary full moon but one called the mourning moon. I found peace in this coincidence: that one full year later a moon would hang brilliantly overhead as a symbol of culminations, commencements, and letting go. It is to be thought of like this: imagine it to be illuminating the darkest moments of your past year so you can visit them one last time before turning away from them. This can apply to so much of the past year for me but it is certain that I will likely never turn completely away from the loss of my father.

I took a vacation day for tomorrow. I don’t know what I will do on the 1^st anniversary of his passing but the idea is to be off the grid, move through the day on my own, free of chatter and responsibility, so I can breathe.

I miss you, Dad.

In propinquity,

Nic

Lost Boy

Lost Boy

when we lost you

I sat in front of my

Kmart radio and wept

your absence

was not a fate

but a deep fury

amplified by losing

the privilege to visit

and watch you grow

too much to abide

dealing in despair

grasping memories

it was a long-lived

and sullen loneliness

the forced separation

you became the shadows

in all of my short-stories

quiet whispers in my poems

when we lost you

my heart capsized

my lungs closed

no words would come

I was unable to pray

I couldn’t find you

yet I love you

(always)
as if you

weren’t lost to us at all

**

Small poem. Big meaning.

In propinquity,
Nic

Joys Fears Pains Sensitivities

Joys Fears Pains Sensitivities

I wonder what it feels like to be a young Bob Dylan in a

Greenwich Village apartment making prank phone calls

or the endless repetition of supernatural light creating

beautiful sun-bleached palettes of a wild paradise fire

I imagine myself as prevalent and brimming with cool

the sole owner of one inspired and continuous blunder

protected by the diaphanous sheath of obliviousness

digging dramatic ground to entomb the barefaced verity

an indolent string of made-up words are the train-tracks

to the bleached-bone straightforwardness of not knowing

the look of a dominant voice recommending you to surrender

your whole heart for something important named after you

to not be in attendance for your own departure diminishes its

perfection and resolve like balancing dancers on the memory

of the very last lines emblazoned on the softness of the sand

joys fears pains sensitivities

we were never meant to survive

under one small star

**

It is wet and cold outside today. Coincidentally, it’s also Halifax’s Parade of Lights. My buds and I are going to brave the cold and damp with layers and rain ponchos and participate. I am still planning my attire in my head as I type this. Should be fun even if a little uncomfortable due to the elements but we’ll be together, united, ready to soak in a little holiday cheer. Cheer never hurt no one!

I slept in good this morning. I had a rough heart day yesterday so I turned my phone off at 9ish, binge watched some Parks and Recreation for a little lightness and headed to sleep by 11ish. Sadness is exhausting but I woke up today, made a hearty brunch, a pot of tea and did some writing (the result being the above poem). While writing I listened to Adele’s 25 and Chris Stapleton’s Traveller records, both of which I love. I should have been working on my story but that I will save for tomorrow. This morning I just felt like filling my ears with music while I tinkered with words. It felt good.

Wishing you a bountiful Saturday. However you spend it, I hope joy finds you.

In propinquity,

Nic

I Am So Often Alone

I Am So Often Alone

for a future that is not hers

authorial sympathy fashions

the forgery of her character

each breath is inescapable

a slow subjective emergence

articulated w/ a fractured force

in the hollow of things imagined

unacquainted with amour-propre

she resembles an unfinished echo

an impassioned woman with no

abhorrence for solitary pursuits

emerges from a fragile prison

to confess:

“I am so often alone in here,

so often exiled but bursting to

become speech, to become

a radiant devotee, turn toward

the softness of the superb sun,

spread outside of myself, and sing.”

she is so often alone

in the small sweetness of living

an affirmation made imperfect

she is so often alone

**

Dedicated to anyone feeling alone in their skin, in their home, their relationships, their workplace, their community, the world.

In propinquity,

Nic

Bataclan Angels

These are my people. Beautiful, vibrant faces gathered for the sole purpose of filling their ears and spirits with the euphoric romp of the rock ‘n’ roll. These are my people, elated and adrenaline-filled, mashed up against barriers, buds and strangers, beer sloshing, dancing machines righteously singing their lungs out until it hurts. These are my people, who came to rock and spill into the streets drenched in sweat, high on the power of live music.

My intention is not to write a large, emotional missive on terrorism, my thoughts on it or the plight of refugees in the middle east etc. I will leave that to the fancy news makers and the grossly opinionated and uneducated.  My intent is to simply and lovingly pay tribute to my people, the people who worked for the weekend to arrive at a Friday night that was to hold adventure and the awesomeness of Eagles of Death Metal. My people, had no idea that stepping out into  the Paris this night would cost them their lives. For that, I grieve an indescribable ache.

I have been where they were. Not at the Bataclan, not in Paris, but in their shoes: worked to the bone Monday to Friday, anticipating a night certain to nourish my ravenous core by way of the power and indecent decibel of rock ‘n’ roll enhanced by quality time with my buds, and exultation of it all happening right in front of you. I live for that. I always have. I am sure so many in that theatre on Friday night did too.

My heart goes out to those people whose lives were taken so senselessly, in such a callous and violent manner: young effervescent individuals rife with potential and vigor. My prayers go to those they’ve left behind, family, friends, colleagues, and their dreams. My heart is also extended in love to those who were inside and escaped with their lives or who still struggle with their injuries.

I cannot pretend to understand what they’ve been through, but I’ve been where they are: in the front row, amped up, starved for live music, the escape and the potent freedom it engenders.

The next time I am where they were, the time after that and so on, I will think of them, honour them, my people. Music, the universal language - is dedicated to you.

In propinquity,

Nic

Amor, etc.

Amor, etc.

champions of universal abundance

need not possess corresponding verbs

to inherit a charitable core of grace

just to believe in the marvels of nature

to consider love an unexplainable mystery

is response enough to attain such earthly joy

benevolent artifacts are prescribed nouns

but amor bares all resemblances to Delight

unconditional, lionized, selfless, altruistic

let love alter your pride in life’s calamity

let love sate your hunger for ample ruin

let love embrace the fear of your burdens

champions of universal goodness

need not worry over the present moment

they’ll gather up their words and emit light

amor, etc …

**

After watching the Remembrance Day ceremony on CBC, like so many others I know, I spent the day exercising my pen. I sat to finish this poem and ended up having one of those 'out of body' writing sessions. It wasn't until I received a text from a friend that I snapped out of it and back to reality. After this poem I started looking at notes for Tilda's story but somehow ended up starting from scratch on an older story idea. In that session, I feverishly wrote almost 5000 words! My eyeballs are sore and my shoulder is burning but hellllls yes! Way to go, self! It was magical, zoning out like that and accomplishing what I did. Of course, some of it is good and some of it is absolute crap but that can be addressed in the edit. This mid-week ease, made possible by the brave men and women who have served and serve our amazing country, was well spent. I also know it was a good writing session because I emerged from my room looking like absolute trash! Haha! No one said writing was a glamorous job.

In propinquity,
Nic

Ode to Flânerie

Ode to Flânerie

artist-poet

idle about town

making short notes

taking quick snaps

roaming aimlessly

by languid stride

fervent wanderer

wholly detached

amateur detective

utterly enthralled

astride my heart

a poised calm

pleasurably free

airy perspective

artist-poet

idle about town

a Flâneur

brazenly unaided

delightfully so

**

My dear friend Ruthie introduced me to the word Flânerie. Its meaning simply: aimless idle behaviour. Much like many an artist date. It’s an enjoyable word, it rolls off the tongue like a dream and then sets into motion the glorious act of bumming around without a plan, putting you in adventure’s way, following any whim. I have done this countless times, participated in such a manner and soaked up every single glorious second of it. I have always been grateful to consider my artist dates an exercise in flânerie, always grateful to my dear friend for sharing the essence of it. I am an absolute Flâneur, no question: unapologetically so, so unapologetic that I wrote this silly little poem as a way of shouting my love for flânerie from the rooftops. And, as a thank you to Ru.

Roam free, fair-weather friends!

In propinquity,

Nic

De Profundus

I have spent my day thinking about loss. My Dad, Erica’s Mom (it’s her birthday today), love, friendships, jobs: all of the big ones that shuffled the pieces of my insides around enough that some of the pieces simply disappeared. I thought of Mom Jackson’s crazy laugh and about all of the people she loved most gathering at her resting place, adorning it with flowers, tears and the deepest love. I thought of my last exchange with her and then I thought of my Dad. My last I love you to him, whispered inside his bedroom door where he lay in dim light, his chest heaving, close to his earthly exit. I was vacuuming the floors, thoughtfully until I was sobbing uncontrollably.  I relayed it a bit to Erica in a text, how I have found this to be an incredibly hard year and was feeling that weight today just a little too heavily from thinking and feeling and longing for things I no longer have, people. It opened so many wounds and conjured my sorrows, ones I deserved, ones I didn’t, and ones I still to this day do not understand.  And then there’s death. Who can ever fully comprehend that kind of loss? It is one thing to lose someone to life’s circumstances and know that somewhere in the world they are still looking up at the same stars but to try and resolve that someone you love is looking down at you from them? Well, that is another can of worms entirely.

In that vein, and from sitting here staring the cover of the book cover Ruthie and Terri sent me to accompany my early birthday surprise, I wrote a wee poem:

De Profundus

I used to smother

under the burden

of barely breathing

in a weighted life

but one daring day

I reached down deep

into my chest where

my heart used to be

found a fist full of nerve

and told myself to exhale

&

out of the depths

I climbed

**

Time for a cup of tea, a few pages of my book until my evening errands commence.

However you spent your Sunday, I hope it soothed you somehow.

In propinquity,

Nic