Standard Average Canadians

Standard Average Canadians

it feels secretive

languid

listening to

Man Machine Poem

after dark in his

basement apartment

the kind-hearted drummer & I

make our anchorage

cross-legged on baggy pillows

beneath tawny rondure lights

walls festooned with sad totems

hand-made birch bark canoes &

a burning vision of Irving Layton

                framed

everything entertainingly fussy

we huddle with

aromatic smolder

cold Clementina San Pellegrino

paralleling our pocket knives

folders of hand-written poems

                construing Gord’s lyrics

“tearin’ up the pea patch, isn’t he”

                he says in halted speech

“like rushing the dark with pious light”

                I reply timorously

& just like that he cartwheels over

                the chesterfield & fails

I laugh so hard I spit out a mouthful

                of stars

we group again with snacks

warm garlic knots & dipping sauce

& he delivers a blistering lecture

of my interpretation of the record

                                as a whole

                the needle rebounds & crackles

a gentle warning

                he chides

for reading too much into the chaos

discerning a pattern that might not

                be there

I shrink to the shape of a fraud

                chip like shale

& he says

“it’s a precarious time

for the Caribou, we are the

Ancient Pines singing & praying for

the sky clap to send us downstream,

& the cancer spirits to map their way

to another world – don’t buckle under

the weight of occasion”

the kind-hearted drummer

draws a clean breath

cradles my shrugged shoulder

with a meaty palm & squeezes

                “we listen with the

Intention to live, it is the way

of the Poet …

words survive”

it feels melancholy

as we separate from     

the floor boards to

say goodnight &

gather up all the clever things

he runs a comb under a slow

running tap

                then through his hair

I zip my jacket tight under-chin

                I walk home through

inky midnight    

I ponder the evening’s

decorous language

                                acrobatic humour

calming potions

                easy listening

                gathering gratitude

I long for our

next meeting

after dark           

                in his basement apartment

eating hand-cut fries &

                juicy burgers with BBQ sauce

relish mustard & sharp cheese

a Bugs Bunny film-fest

& name brand ketchup chips

                disagreeing about

used bookstores & punk-rockers

                politics passions

& practical magic

I imagine we will revisit

                Man Machine Poem

interpret Gord’s lyrics again

 two Standard Average Canadians

                trying to decipher love

 **

Just a wee work-in-stages. It took some time to peck this one out. I was uber inspired Friday while I was up to my eye-balls in work but I scribbled in between the numbers crunch and then added/subtracted/re-arranged a bit over the weekend. I lost my steam by Saturday evening and wasn't feeling one bit creative so today while slurping soup, I pecked until I was glad. I'm glad.

Happy Monday.

In propinquity,

Nic

The Esoterics

The Esoterics

regard them

brusk quittance

biting bark

stark gaze

harsh play

blood flesh

the

esoterics

blanketed laps

vast breathing

rousing a low grade

                controversy

raising Poets from the

                dead

pressing you to choke

inside a mottled gulch   

                of despair’s

tragic pitch

under rucked

night-glint

their eyes narrow in

suspicion

while we wade

through

budding fog       

                at the void’s edge

a banquet of grate

and sand

to guzzle

                all contingent on

 which of the poets choose

                to lie still

**

This poem materialized from the ether today, out of the wide blue. I was busily champing figures, evaluating, altering; all things to do with numbers, when the Esoterics prodded me. Who am I to deny them their poetic fifteen?

 I am moody, grey and restless today, all in the sunshine. I admit, pecking helped but then it always does.

In propinquity,

Nic

Two Poets

Two Poets

two poets rave

in downtown Halifax

his stride matchers her pace

both knocked by hurly-burly

poems

with all their words missing

our eyes

monitor their molten movements

how he lures verses out from under

                her lovely dress

how she forgets how to swim to him

& the explosion

of stars in each willowy hand

they are all we refuse to ignore

                unrestrained inheritance

two poets rant

in a dingy basement bar

still downtown Halifax

                in their limited light

opening sentences taste the same

as the shiny elastic prayers hidden

in the luxury of our worry

he is an action not taken

& she a simple twist of fate

                perfect bodies

                purple hearts

                parallel pains

two poets

                who unbutton the night

leave everything bare

skip town before dawn

                & we all take the blame

for everything they left behind

**

Vacation has been nice. A good break from the 9 to 5. I intended to devour books, write my face off, and do a ton of creative stuff: if daydreaming counts … I did spend a good chunk of time on my own, breathing and thinking, musing and scheming but I failed to follow through on the ‘plan’ and instead went with the flow. Isn’t that more of what a vacation should be? I do regret not taking more time to write though. I have to get my head back in the game but until this week is over I won’t shove myself too hard for it.

Today’s pecking was fun. I set up a ‘best of’ Matt Mays playlist (to get my soul prepared for my Hubbards get away next weekend), poured myself a ice cold cider purchased from a road trip I took on Thursday with my best bud, and just dug in.  I mentioned twice today how I hadn’t written enough on vacation to two different people so it was time.

Drinks and laughs tonight with friends and then my last day of vacation tomorrow before returning to the work desk but burning through the days so my weekend in Hubbards with friends comes quickly.

Happy Saturday!

In propinquity,

Nic

Anniversary

Anniversary

you

crossed my mind this morning

the time you grazed my shoulder

in the garden

with your dazzling wings

they shimmered in the sunbeams

yellow & burnt orange framed in

                black

graceful transmitters of messages

                of courage

                of conviction

                of patience

you confided the simplest truths

                the

universe surely is made of music

& that God’s capacity is so much

greater than man’s understanding

these moments

these small ceremonies

granted visions from the beyond

quantify the joys you left behind

& like

the wind in the weeping willows

my heart dangles in the open air

                I remember

our meeting as sweetly as our

                parting

**

A year ago today an extraordinary woman was taken far too soon. I remember her today, with love, sitting next to a sunny open window, the birds chirping and the breeze warm. This poem is my pause, to evoke her, her life, her heart and those she left behind to carry on her memory.

Miss you, Mama June Jackson.

In propinquity,

Nic

Keeping House

Keeping House

I often find my truest self

in invitations to over-haul

re-arrange the chesterfield

the ottoman the wingbacks

dust the bookshelves the

family photos the nooks

and crannies neglected

polish the floor wash the

dishes piled on the counter

the richness of tan pennies

chiming in my apron pocket

call me to private reveries

of Cattulla’s silk bedspread

keeping house reciting taut

penetrating poetry into the

urgency of the spin cycle

swirling gyrating orbiting

working into a frenzy then

interrupted abruptly by the

clunk & chime of the cuckoo

clock kids will be home soon

dinner isn’t going to cook

itself – better snap out of it

I often find my truest self

outside of my inauthentic

self recounting the words of

a Latin poet I hate & I love

what ever

would my husband say?

**

Catullus is a poet that is new to me. He was startling for his time, often explicit in his writings, and while nothing is shocking these days, it’s always a marvel to stumble upon one of the rebels, who refused to censor his work or his passions. To speak so overtly is the true rebellion, to not be afraid, as Chuck Palahniuk once told me, to look like an asshole. (To this day, that is the best advice I’ve ever been given.)

I look forward to … ahem … exploring more from this poet.

Too hot to really think today but I pecked and that’s good.

In propinquity,

Nic

Uneasy Verse

Uneasy Verse

spouts of uneasy verse

burden my inward youth

the pong of damp books

locked deep in Granny’s

dank dirt floor basement

tomes filled with wicked              

words that seep into your

skin ripple there slowly &

rarely do they desert you

even when you grow taller

than the tales themselves

a whiff of a used bookstore

smells like the sense of

being caught filching a few

of Granny’s books barely

escaping her gangly grip

out-running her sour balm

& screech - it’s every bit a

twisted tenderness trap

– current fragrances

conjuring childhood heed

now my stanzas are written

wisely,  scent free

**

Maybe it’s from watching the runaway Netflix hit ‘Stranger Things’, the creepy vibe of this out-of-the-blue poem. Perhaps it is from the memory of my Nanny MacPherson maiming with a pumice stone, a hunk of porous volcanic abrasive rock used to remove or calloused skin: too bad she couldn’t understand I had psoriasis on my elbows. I also started to re-watch ‘American Horror Story: Asylum’. Any number of things could have leaked from my jam-packed subconscious to pull this little piece together. I had this imagine in my head, an old basement under a creaky house, full of musty books and the gate-keeper came in the form of an old crotchety woman. This in no way is a reflection of my Nan! She certainly wasn’t perfect but she was demure, even when cranky. I just remember her being stern and strict when she came to visit. Everything had to be just so; her way or the highway. She died when I was in junior high and softened a great deal. When she lived with us in the end, I remember she laughed a lot but bossed my Mama around like a drill sergeant. That had never changed. Bless her heart.  

An eerie little poem for a rainy old day.

In propinquity,
Nic

Madoc Says Magic Is Afoot

Madoc Says Magic Is Afoot

Madoc says

magic is afoot

to appeal

deadened hues

away from the

oppressors tongue

to cull poems

from the Aegean Sea

to render God

alive

                above

humid nimbus clouds

enough to make a

brooding genius shudder

Madoc says

magic is afoot

because

Leonard Cohen

read aloud

                a verse

that left him

slouched into a corner

recounting a lone

bellow of wistfulness

Madoc says

magic is afoot

in a collection

                the

author’s  name

barely visible

                on the

thin spine

a book of revelations

bought and sold

for one single

line of truth

etched with

                a ballpoint pen

by a reliable witness

Madoc is always

right

**

I’ve reading ‘Startle and Illuminate – Carol Shields on Writing’ – it’s been a comfort to pursue her collected advice and to, in some small way, spend time with her again the way I did inside of all of her other books, stories, and poems. I have been keeping my eyes, ears; heart and mind open for an opportunity to begin a new short story. I can feel it bubbling somewhere under the surface. I have started and stopped SO many stories over the last year or so. I attribute it to Liz Gilbert’s assertion that if the story did not materialize, then it wasn’t my story to tell, the idea will pass on to some other waiting writer. I like that imagery. That thought. I’d hate for them to never be told so I hold on to the hope it will weed up into a comrade’s think bank and flourish. The poetry has been (as always) a saving grace but I want to sink my teeth into a story.

For now, I wait patiently. Madoc insists magic is afoot …

And obviously, this poem was Leonard Cohen inspired.

In propinquity,

Nic