locked (to j.)

some evenings we bundle up and
take a walk
side by side on the frozen streets
of this little windswept winter town

stars prick out the blackness
on the darker corners
and we look and
see orion
and ursa major
and other unknown collections of distant suns

and I imagine they are there just for us
lighting our joined journey
through a windy and cold world
where we
lean on the other for
strength
------- truth
-------------- assurance
-------------------------love

like a pair of suns locked in each other’s orbit
seen from below as one bright star in the chilled heavens

we will walk together
until our boots crunch the driveway snow
and we are home

Dad - my morning memories

I see him standing at the bottom of the stairs in our Gretna house
white shirt and tie calling impatiently for me to come down to breakfast
bill guest speaking importantly from the radio in the kitchen and then I
come down sleepy-eyed the only one left in the house all others off at
university or working sitting down to toast and chokecherry jam and
coffee but first he reads the calendar devotional thick index fingers
rolling up the thin paper as he reads in German of course then a prayer
and the radio goes back on cbc news marking the day with an event or
two from the middle east I may ask a question and he knows the answer
but it is usually a wordless meal before we rush into the brown dodge and
we drive the tree-lined streets to the school where he is the principal and
I am in awkward grade 9 in class he was a different person animatedly
telling stories about Martin Luther or John A. and making history come
alive me not questioning the disconnect between the taciturn father and
brilliant teacher just accepting the unspoken love that flowed between our
distant but intertwined spirits

Leonard Cohen (a tribute)

a cold draft wafts through the house as I think of you
sitting in your isolated retreat
scraps of paper strewn
verses penned by the insistant muse that keeps you going

you lived in Greece for a while
in some white-washed home
arches for doorways
with blue table
I saw pictures in a songbook
and I learned all your songs
trying to pick the guitar just like you
singing Suzanne with my cousin having no idea what it meant
but loving the language of tea and oranges

your hair was black then
your voice versatile subtle
and you wrote of love for Marianne and Suzanne
but it was more than that
because it held me in trance
the love was spiritual
Suzanne was also a church
church of body----mind------heart-----soul

and you kept going
intertwined hearts making a star of David
your ultimate symbol
and yet you also struggled with the coldness in the house
a cold and broken halleluiah
------- worth singing but fraught with middle age

and then came the mountaintop
the time for introspection
for holiness as
hair became grey
topped by a hat
and voice dropped to the depths
the basis of everything

and you showed yourself
on stage
vulnerable
praying
flying above all the others in your depth

and always like a chilled house you
presenced my life
dis/comforting like a famous
blue
raincoat

Mendelssohn

you run out to greet him
forgetting your coat in the
snow crunching cold

“I’ve been waiting for you,” you say
his frosty sideburns quiver as he smiles
and heads to the warmth of the house
rubbing hands together as he sits and waits for his tea

That’s a beautiful flower he says as he notices
the amaryllis on the table
I love flowers looking closely
the extraordinary colours and shapes

sipping, he notices your photo albums
may I look he says

you hand him a few
they are family shots of your kids mostly

he examines each carefully
noticing eager faces in the pictures
the obvious love in the eyes
the natural smiles
the busy atmosphere

treasure this
he says
such harmonic loving beauty

and you nod in the warmth of
your status so described

winter loosens grip

white undulations still dominate landscape
in the sub-zero prairie outdoors
but little semi-tones of change
whisper that winter is withering away for another year

sun staying longer in early evening
ahh dusk
rising earlier
bright morning
and rice flakes of warmth peel on a clear blue day

the ides of February approaches
with foolish fantastic thoughts of
roses bought
wrapped
and delivered to worthy waiting arms
followed by kisses

red lips meeting in anticipation

of spring!

Lynette's hugs

they started in her toes
crunching in a ball
-------she loved finding lint between those pudgy toes
and moved up those ferociously strong legs
scissoring my waist
-------legs that could bend any which way
-------and became pistons with skates leaping and twirling
-------in phrased figures
her body glued to mine in unflinching love
-------small but filled with giggles and sweet sweet summer
and then the arms around the neck vice-like
that wouldn’t let go as if love was an endurance contest
-------with perfect hands that can do anything they want

finally head buried in neck
fine hair tickling
thought forgotten in this wild explosion of pure affection

treatments (water poem VI)

like thousands of others
I have this device under my skin
right under my collarbone
connected to my vein fanning out to entire body

for eight months
I’ve gone to have a needle stuck into the
round valve
through the skin

and bags of water turned into chemical
have dripped their shaded liquid
through my veins
to every part of my fragile flesh

and now it’s over
done
finished
vessels empty

for now

water of renewal has been poured

the device stays though
-------just in case