1950 Something, Approximately

1950 Something, Approximately

expected

girl-next-door bloom

tight cinched waist-line

billowing skirt

pronounced bust-line

nylon mesh petticoat

plastic pop pearls

slender wristwatch

subdued wedding ring

colorful clip-on earrings

polka dots/florals/gingham

                galore

demure days    

                sprightly nights

a queen of domesticity

glorified servant trophy wife

a happy little homemaker

two point two kids

                one boy

                one girl

    one on

    the way

proud curator of a tidy house

a twin-tub washing machine      

a perfectly manicured lawn

                a white picket fence

sought

higher education

horn-rimmed academic status

card carrying member of the

                peace caravan

a nifty mischief maker

    pro-choice

celebrator of hard won

victories

for equal pay    

                birth control

books not bombs

                Rosie the Riveter

                Wendy the Welder

ender of blatant sexual

                discrimination

Ms. Herstory

    feminine for freedoms

titleholder of body geography

Great Mother Goddess

no cage

no limits

                no expectations

breaking barriers

                of sketched stereotypes

stand with your sisters 

                who do for themselves

**

I am a woman. A human being. A free-thinker. A creative. A humanist. A daughter. An aunt. A friend. A poet. Employed. Thoughtful. Generous. Emotional. Strong. I am a woman. I matter. Female lives matter. Mothers. Grandmothers. Sisters. Single. Married. Divorced. Widowed. All women matter. At all times. 

Stand up. Shout. For your freedoms. Stand up, men. For your females. Stand with them. Not against them. 

Sisters, believe in your. I do.

In propinquity,

Nic

When I Danced On Skates

When I Danced On Skates

it all started with a dramatic entrance

my self-deprecating hyper- aware BFF

in toe – both of us on roller skates

my crazy ass legs & fancy foot work

sent me colliding into a mirrored wall

                all for the promise of cute boys

the hardwood floors of the roller disco

                ravaged my virtue

a step up from losing rolls of quarters

in a dim-lit smoke-filled video arcade

I traded smelling like a filthy ashtray

for a life for girl sass – lacing up skates

in           

                crop tops

                fab leggings

                headbands

                leg-warmers

                rainbow socks

nearly cobalt blue smoky eyes

& too cool for school attitude

our style:  decidedly mature for sure

brightly coloured pom-poms on the

                toes of the skates led me

cruising around the rink skating backwards

weaving though the reflection of the disco

ball & bopping strobes

to all 14 thumping minutes of Rapper’s Delight

the rocky quiver & twist of Ballroom Blitz

ending up at the snack bar for cold soda pops

absorbing the hidden tensions that make

young love so hard

between the slight the plump the oo-la-las

                & the James Blondes

the night I had my first skate kiss the place

was crawling w drunk teen-agers roller boogying

                … ahh freak out …

me & my Cyndi Lauper BFF

snuck a bottle of beer she stole from her uncle’s

fridge into the bathroom to cool off like big shots

titter a little & change back into our black cotton

parachute pants & pastel shaker-knit sweaters

head back to the snack bar to ogle the fair

object of my lip smacker leaning cool

& watch pepperoni pizza dry out under a heat lamp

until Dad rolled up in the snot green station wagon

                those were the days

when I danced in skates with my screwball BFF

    kissing boys       

                in the heavy heat

                of that roller skating rink

                every Saturday night

oh … to be young is to be light

**

It is to be noted that I listened to Rapper’s Delight, in its entirely, on repeat, until I finished writing this.

It was fun.

In propinquity,

Nic

My Last Cup of Tea

My Last Cup of Tea

it was when I was pouring

hot steaming water over

a cup of cured tea leaves

I realized: I come from a

long line of women who

are difficult to love

I sat my divided self down

into the sumptuous brown

leather of my writing chair

to recall my last charitable

                intended

an introvert in a 3 piece suit

his head akin to a minefield

lives by making prose poetry

                reads sad books

I set inconvenient boundaries

kept in constant motion always

                one stride ahead

he told me, ‘Everything craves

                its opposite.’

he devoted fluent squawkings

to the blue hue of my eyes

                the curve of my hip

in the hopes I’d fall in step

behave like a woman in love

I made him fumble to fade

memories

you cannot send back

                affection lost

it was when I was pouring

hot steaming water over

a cup of cured tea leaves

I realized: my will is strong

yet I still long for his trundle

   on the staircase

appearing with a soft kiss

    a new verse

    a fetching beam

I sat my divided self down

to pen fables for my

                solitude

    to expel it

to continue to leave

    myself 

stalwart with a plunged                

                heart

my last cup of tea revealed

                the true narrative

    of Sorrow’s captive

**

We are closing in on the last few days of poetry month and it appears that I have had a decent amount of poetry in me for the duration. Pleased to have been able to write as much as I have in recent weeks. I still can’t get a grip on the short story I wanted to write. The words start then stop. The character is visible but the intent is failing me. I’m not sure whether this is one of those cases where I will be struck with the lightning bolt delivering that ‘ah-ha’ moment and go to town or perhaps it’s as Big Magic suggests, the idea isn’t mine. I really want it to be mine. We’ll see. For now though, I am more than content to churn out the verses. The one I am currently pecking at is proving to be a challenge but I will keep at it.

More tea, more words.

In propinquity,

Nic

The Artist

The Artist

it was a fever at dawn

a slow-motion vertigo

searching for my faith

craving your opposite

ripped from feathery

                daydreams

wading through vague

corrections about what

happened to you

where did you go

fortune’s darling

prophet

pimp

protester

high priest

witness

the artist formally known

with a downcast incertitude

your opulent life and times

softly passes back and forth

between the brokenhearted

trembling through every last

shade of purple

for illumination

for heartsease

where did you go

what does it symbolize

               

            relentless

rigorous

taskmaster

while we wait

while we weep                

the song remains

                                the same

               

this is

truly what it sounds like               

                when Doves cry

**

My phone exploded the day Prince died. I found it hard to believe much like the news of Bowie's passing. Prince was such a large and funky part of my life's soundtrack, I am certain so many others would agree. It took me a few days to process the news. It was unbelievable until I realized that CNN hadn't whispered a word about Donald Trump in almost two days. It was surreal, it still is. I cried watching Stevie Wonder being interviewed. It's a grave loss.  He was music, a level above and beyond genius, and someone who changed music in the most profound of ways. He was a genre unto himself and the world will never see the likes of such a thing again. 

We are losing our icons. 2016 has been a difficult year for the music community and those of us who live for and support it since we were knee-high to grasshoppers. It still pains me to know that this generation will never know how exciting it is to have experienced music before the internet, when it was a rite of passage to stay up late for the Grammy Awards and American Music Awards, music TV ... they were amazing days. The beauty though is that the music, in the case Prince's massive body of work, a timeless discography, will live on, play on and continue to inspire young minds and artists. 

Music does save. It is eternal, even when our icons leave us. That is the blessing and to have ever had them in the first place.

There are so many ways I could have written about Prince but it only seemed to write from an honest and emotional place, the same place where I feel music. 

In propinquity,

Nic

Lunching With Joe

Lunching With Joe

there is a

sweet disorder

to lunching with Joe

deep in the middle of

the worst month

cowered in a dim crook

among the Irish barflies

their scruffy clothes

brooding looks

& racking coughs

over pints of draft beer

empty soup cups

& lively ukulele music

we are

dedicated to poetry

he draws

the world closer

proximate to touch

shouting lines from        

haikus

                sonnets               

                                odes

words warp w/ a romantic

crookedness

he is a buoyant devotee

confronting impossibility

                & my decrees

are prized in his company

words wound tight

fitted w/ implication

so when I rise to leave

                sodden of poet sage

(how the end

always begins)

inexpressible anguish

                floods his fair face

& he murmurs low

a lonesome farewell

I was beginning to love you

                alas you leave

he is unaware

                of my grieving

**

The title of this poem came from book passage and I couldn't get it out of my head. I fell asleep last night dreaming about two souls converging in an old dark pub, among vagrants, over sustenance in bowls and cups, sharing their musings about poetry. A union fleeting yet rife with meaning. It was an image, a relationship I couldn't shake. 

And so, I tackled it. Played with it. Molded it and composed it. 

Another nugget for poetry month. 

In propinquity,

Nic

Fate/Fury

Fate/Fury

audaciously overlook

the intricate methods

of how love sanctifies

our erratic convictions

damaged gentlefolk

amid plea & perdition

contour the indefinite

leverage the medley

suffused in contrition

endowed by elegance

a crooked faith found

to pardon our evils

a fate & fury to suffer

a contrapuntal opus

plague transformed

oppressively fraught

to evocative grace

the heart

the fury

                                the fate

**

I was reading recently about the 'red string of fate': an East Asian belief derived from a Chinese legend. According to the myth, the Gods tie an invisible red cord around the ankles of those who are destined to meet, or who are meant to help one another. 

I love the concept, the idea of being bound to strangers who will soon be positives in your life. And so, in turn, in a small way, this wee poem was born.

In propinquity,

Nic

Buch

Buch

a strong book

quiet & subtle

disassembles

atop

a coffee table

this to him

is a piece of music

**

A small poem for a Sunday morning inspired by reading a little piece of arts news. 

It's a beautiful morning. Teapot (a literal one) is empty, errands are looming but afterward I am stepping outside for some fresh air and maybe a walk. Likely to the sea.

Spend your Sunday smiling.

In propinquity,

Nic

Listening to La Ciengea Just Smiled

Listening to La Ciengea Just Smiled

four o’clock in the afternoon

listening to La Ciengea Just Smiled

                (while Ryan Adams sings)

sun dances slowly on the windowsill

                and here I am

raising tender mercies

the ones that are crystalline

in the confessional verse of

creative malice

a curious engagement rehearsed

guardedly while the moon is low

& heavy

listening to La Ciengea Just Smiled

the blue vase he gave me filled with

                vetch and iris blooms

a fire fetches deep down inside

                poems lay on the desk

unfinished

where they will remain

until the piano player explains

                himself

listening to La Ciengea Just Smiled

on repeat

                 then Gram Parsons       

                                Grievous Angel

**

'Heartbreaker' is one of my all-time favorite records, beloved for its sad power and skillful songwriting. The news that Ryan Adams is releasing it shortly in a deluxe box-set THRILLS me and makes it that much more important to acquire a turn-table. I. Must. Have. I. MUST. 

I wrote this little poem listening to the titled song on repeat. That part is truth. The rest, as they say, is fiction. 

Is that a saying? 

Oh hey.

Anyhow, both songs mentioned in the poem are gems. If you aren't familiar, go listen. You should. Actually, you must. 

Aren't I bossy today?

In propinquity,

Nic

Song of reference just in case:

Pining For Paris

Pining for Paris

my longing is etched long bold letters

pining for Paris & cheap un-taxed wine

cheeses & meats from tripe butchers

they describe unrequited passions for a

tall, angular, red-bearded Poet I met in

an ambiguous little Left Bank theatre

the balm of his velvet jacket still haunts

much like our exchange of amorous sighs

him bare-chested & magnificently mannered

a stalwart protector of my ancient ramparts  

& staunch supporter of my peculiar feuds with

the glamorous daughters of the Latin Quarter

it has been the bluest season summer in Sausalito

without the grandeur & misery of artistic struggles

bound to an up-market houseboat with a warm

wood-burning stove & flinty marble kitchenette

anyone else would adopt this way-to-live-easy

flower-power/beatnik/60’s ethos of peace & love

as a sleepy delight, a passive anchorage, rescue

nestled in a pine-forest inspecting an inlet stippled

with millionaire’s homes perched high on stilts

cormorants floating on calm waters of the blue bay

estuary & seals basking in the glint of morning sun

yet I am pining for Paris’s 19^th century cityscape

crisscrossed with wide abundant boulevards

I miss my hideously imaginative & fraught friends

Mathilde, Guillaume, Ponce, Helene, Tempeste

the fledgling virgins tittering on cold cobblestones

in bright floppy hats waiting on fetching singers

I miss my mouth full of pink marquise diamonds

these ox-eye daises are rancorous to the tongue

I miss chain-smoking, pomposity, & sexist editors

with debauched parsing and lumbering syntax

I prefer the raised eyebrows of the highbrow

two glasses of Bordeaux to quench a squabble

rosy begonias perfectly paired with sartorial feats

to offset waves of elation and despair only the

pulling each other apart at the seams could cull

I want lethargies & stale perfume wafting though

where old ornate & painted ostrich eggs adorned

the lip of a gaudy over-sized bronzed bathtub

instead here I lounge in Sausalito in my wretchedness

writing sexually charged poems about Frank O’Hara

pining profoundly for Paris & it’s seductive bohemia

wine & figs the muse of impressionist painters

once the bloody cynosure of the French Revolution

I long for the heartbreak & the madness of it all

occupying berry-hued café chairs with dusky company

their thick fingers curling around burgundy rimmed cups

give me back my poets,

give me absolute beginners

                the young & the restless

                                return me to my reason.

**

Been pecking at this one for awhile. I've added, subtracted, deleted, re-entered and re-arranged so many times I've lost count. I had this pang from a wee character explaining how, even though she is now residing in a beautiful retreat, she longs for and prefers the mess and drama of her former life in a much different time.

It was fun to write. I am certain, in future, there will be more changes, additions and take-aways, but for now, I blog.

Happy Friday! 

In propinquity,

Nic

Creative Criminals

Creative Criminals

Imagine: a gritty chase novel

two lonesome ghost riders

with the dissolute demeanor

of stiff whiskey sodden poets

in muted cable-knit turtlenecks

taut bell-bottom jeans & square

toed leather boots with big brass

side buckles battering the sands

ancient teenagers poured into

the husk of an old GM rattler

deviating around hulk pines

old rickety & flaking billboards

shallow tarns & gutsy swerves

hawking tobacco squash into

hollow long neck beer magnums

fulfilling a long larcenous agenda

scalping Angels check

            highway robbery check

blatant plagiarism check

flagrant bootlegging check

two doomed Devils in utter disrepair

fierce fiends of unvarnished veracities

creative criminals

they swindle

they swallow

& then sour

from the blow-back of raw appetites expended

plunging waist-deep in dense, avocado muck

twisting their tight torsos upstream: shit creek.

Somewhere there is a beautiful woman  

in a kitchen thinly slicing fresh vegetables for soup

the sun gathering strength outside of her window

& while she concocts the many ways to disappear

the caravan of days & nights the Misbehavers spent

obscuring were all just to see her soft delicate face        

                one more time.

The plot: scant.

The characters: fictional.

The story: true.

**

Moral of this story? 

Even the derelicts dream.

In propinquity,

Nic

Collage Art - Rock Bottom

This one is for my friend, Keeks. I created this one from an old copy of 'Rock Bottom' (written by one of her idols, Pamela Desbarres) and striking images of some of her rock favorites from various medias. 

It was fun to create and I adorned it at the end with a well-worn guitar pick for good measure.

In propinquity,
Nic

Downtown Poet

Downtown Poet

writing from a cheap apartment

with the hefty drapes frequently

                pinched shut

to boast in obscurity

the Irish Catholic Boy

the Novel Rimbaud

                sinuous rust-red hair

                notched cheekbones

stupidly skinny

his sloppy scrawl on napkins

with a leaky ballpoint pen

                imposing digressions

                panoramic prophecy

gritty punk rock

hip-hop/no-wave

alleyway swagger

poetic propensities

reads reams of Rilke backwards               

                & bottoms out

                just to transcend

as an ephemerist

a downtown poet

in a Chelsea coffee shop

always too late for breakfast

                but always early to the

side-spoon Shangri-La

it is that complicated sort of grief

to run with a gaggle of eccentrics

the comical foil

& then die a death void of ecstasy

**

It's poetry month! I've been avidly writing it, reading it and buying it up. On Saturday I took a road trip with my best bud to the South Shore and spent a little time nosing around in Lexicon Books in Lunenburg. It had a handsome poetry section and indications of the April celebration. I purchased a copy of 'Lunch Poems' by Frank O'Hara. Ironically so because it's been sitting on my Amazon wishlist since binge-watching 'Mad Men' (for the second time). It was meant to be. 

I will be congregating at City Hall with the Open Heart Forgery crew tonight for their annual reading. I have five poems printed and tucked in my bag. I will only read two and like other years, will choose at the 11th hour (the above poem is included in my pile). I am looking forward to being in a room with like-minded folk, word smiths, creatives. I live for this stuff. Great way to start a week and end a busy Monday at the work desk.

Happy Poetry Month!

Write one! Read many! All poets! 

In propinquity, 

Nic 

One of the Ways

One of the Ways

it is something you reference
something that moves on its own

tickling you into a curl of smoke

when you take the long way around

it happens on a day you no longer recall

through a stillness ruined by a drawn-out sigh

it is something that falls into the wrong hands

pressed amid yellowed pages of an old book

it is the correct answer to a dingy demand

something obscured for everybody’s sake

it may be that we are just ordinary people

a man in a dark formal suit & accent tie

a woman with  wide & fixed chocolate eyes

it is something you must to mention

something you see underneath it all

begging the question of why don’t we dance

                   it is just

one of the ways we bend to small miracles

**

I am sitting still at my work desk. The phone isn't ringing, my co-worker beside me us sketching, the sun is streaming through the window and CBC is playing Jeff Buckley's 'Hallelujah".  My heart is heavy in mourning for my sweet uncle's passing, my co-worker's is heavy from the passing of someone she loves too. It's palpable, the shared sadness on our side of the room and yet here we both are, being creative in our down time. There really is something to be said for the power of creativity in a time of need. 

Short and sweet today, just like me.

In propinquity,

Nic