There's a picture of you holding cake,
White frosting on your nose, wanting more
Your mother and father grinning
As you explore sugar as never before.

Behind the cameras, we laugh and clap,
Celebrating a year and nine months' wonder,
A life that we have come to know and love,
A little girl, on a day you're only partially aware.

The dog lies nearby, watching for crumbs,
In his own way celebrating this happy day.
He does not seem to mind he is supplanted
As family favorite; at least, he does not say.

The balloons, the cake, one candle all aflame,
Join our choral "Happy Birthday" song
Follow in the first of what we hope
Will be many, many more to come.

"I think ***** may be a tragic hero,"
A student said,
"Linda tells her boys he is an average man,
And it's time for average men to be attended.
That he gets up and goes to work each day
Is enough to make him a hero."

We listen in the darkened room,
Breaking to think our thoughts aloud
Before we dive back into the pool
Of Loman miseries:
The braggart wearing down,
The cringing rage against
The darning of socks,
Silken stocking memories,
Naughtiness recapitulated.

And sons spinning round
The vortex edge,
Wondering whether
To bail or pledge....

The stage is growing dark,
The audience darker,
Receding from bright memories,
Nobility's idyllic days denied,
Nothing left but the emptiness of pride.

Accepting brassiness and braggadocio,
We lean, breathless beneath skyscrapers,
Accepting commission-only pay,
The emptiness of false news,
And mediocre heroes.

"Boys! The woods are burning!
Can't you understand?
There's a big blaze going all around!"
But no one understands.

We are all dreamers,
Hoping America makes us great again,
Wishing to live the Salesman's life,
Willing to leave Plan B hidden
Behind the fusebox for now...
If only hope remains,
If only champagne wishes,
Caviar dreams besot us in our schemes.

"Nobody dast blame this man!"
Says Charlie, and he is right.
It's tough being out there
Living on a wing and a prayer,
Promising the moon,
Promised the moon,
Age coming on,
No seeds planted,
No sun to shine
On what's left
Of the garden....

A little salary,
A smile,
A shoeshine,
Cannot suffice.

Believing dreams that lie
Is no reason to live;
Seeing the blue sky alone
Is no reason,
If there's nothing to own,
And no place to call home.

Nine years and still
we cradle our grief
carefully close,
like groceries
in paper bags.

Eventually the milk
will make its way
into the refrigerator;
the canned goods
will find their home
on pantry shelves.

Most things find
their proper place.

Eventually the hummingbirds
will ricochet against scorched air,
their delicate beaks stabbing
like needles into the feeder filled
with red nectar on the back porch.

Eventually our child
will make her way
back to us. Perhaps.

But I’ve heard
that shooting
****** feels
like being
buried under
an avalanche
of cotton *****.

For now it’s another
week, another month,
another trip to Safeway.

We drive home and wonder
why it is always snowing.
Behind a curtain of snow,
brake lights pulse, turning
the color of cotton candy,
dissolving into ghosts.

And with each turn,
the groceries shift
in the seat behind us.
From the spot where
our daughter used to sit,
there is a rustling sound—

a murmur of words
crossed off yet another list,
a language we’ve budgeted
for but cannot afford to hear.

The children would be packed and ready days in advance.
At first, we packed for them, but as the years passed,
They were experts at rolling clothes for twice the space,
Using laundry baskets rather than luggage tripled our carriage.
We'd leave early Saturday morning, almost night,
Departing from the Ontario weather like a bad odour.
Kathleen was away at school.
Mags and Andrea were in their teens now.
Ten years of March madness was terminating.

Herself would sit shotgun with Triptik and thermos.
The kids would awaken south of the Ohio,
Hungry, grumpy, and eager.
She had it all planned out.
Crosswords, colouring, wordfinds, books, Gameboys, lace,
Sandwiches, juice boxes, treats of all sorts,
For another twenty hours on the road.

I invariably imagined our Mini in the return lane
As we crossed the Bluewater Bridge into Michigan;
Trip over, kids exhausted, us, quiet, subdued,
Just wanting our own bed.
But twenty hours on the I-75 lay ahead,
Turn left at Knoxville
For Myrtle Beach, sun, tennis, seafood,
Separation.

I found no peace in our final escape.
Conversation with her had halted.
A round-trip of dialogue in my head.
She'd said, I bought a house.
Words wrapped like an egg-salad sandwich.
It was our March break.

she sneezesas the breezes
carry the pollen to her nostrils

she  is small
and somewhat frail
but  when she sneezes
she creates more than breezes
she makes a gale

and the noise is like thunder
as her lungs do the rumba
all in order  to expell
the pollen from her being

her eyes cross
and fixate
on an ephemeral state
in order to calibrate
the legnth of the ah
in her ah-choo

sometimes it is
large and elongated
sometimes small delicate statacco
and then again it may be somewhere
in between the two

and after she sneezes and gales
and wheezes...she seems stunned
by the fuss and disharmony
she created by nasal cacophony

and in her daze, the taps
her nose and says quite clearly

good old faithful....
                           .....thar she blows

My brother is a pilot,
Not just any old pilot...
A tail dragger pilot,
Champions
Cubs,
Super Cubs.

Planes made of spars and fabric,
Held tight
By screws
And dope,
And glue.

Airframes part wood,
Part aluminum,
Part steel.

Fuel tanks sloshing in the wings
Either side above our heads,

Set the mags,
Hand crank the prop,
Turn on the fuel,
Hear her pop
And roar to life.

We strap in
Single file,
Controls fore
And aft.
And rev 'er up
To join the winds.

Once up,
He yells, "She's yours!"
And I am piloting
Or rather gingerly sliding her
About the blue,
Skidding right or left,
Holding my breath,
Wondering how much I dare
To tip her up there in the air.

"I've got the stick!"
He yells, and I let go.
"Don't be afraid to fly it!"
"It's just a machine!"
"Make it do what you want it to do!"

And we are diving toward the ground,
Then bringing her up and tilting 'round.

"Give her fuel when you tilt to turn!"
He demonstrates, and we are standing
On the wing,
Perpendicular and looking to our left and down.

I know he's right,
That I am timid in my flight,
And he is brave with years of joy,
A pilot fearless since he was a boy.

"You want to land?"
I hear him say.

"No, that's alright!"
"Not today!"

To prove how safe it is to fly,
He touches down,
Then bounces high,
And vaults us back into the sky.

We flit across the fields,
And then,
He flies beneath the power lines,
To show how spray planes catch the ends
Of fields.

He skies the plane at either end,
Then bee lines it to the badlands' edge
Where suddenly we're swooping down
Between the canyon walls, and sinking low,
Then, rising, turning to our right,
He sails us toward sun's dying light.
My only hope is that we'll land
Before the night
Erases all our sight.

And sure enough,
The air is calm;
The night is coming on;
Gusting breezes are all gone.

We gently settle once again,
Back at the ranch,
I help wheel her then
Into her waiting hangar pen.

Life can be lived all in a panic;
Fear fills us with a lingering dread,
But we should live our lives
Just like my brother said.

"It's just your life, so make it do
Whatever it is you want it to!"

And when you're changing
Your directions, throttle up!
Don't let the fear of living
Bring you to a needless stop.