Winters can be tedious.
Sun dips into early dusk.
A dead fire refuses to ignite.

There's a quick repetition
of opening and closing blinds
over a barred window.

In need of reflection
I search a familiar face
in an unfamiliar landscape.

I have her in my grasp,
half illusion, half real,
a symbolic mask denies
her true face,

her glittering crown
divides us by its radiance.

Groping in darkness,
I stumble over objects
of wood and stone,
my unsteady tread tripping
over their contours.

I light a candle.

Bathed in amber light,
our shadows merge.

A new door opens,
stretching the perspective.
No formal borders here,
they wouldn't survive
the present climate.

In their place,
intricately carved
figureheads and totems-
a vision of the past.

My eye is a camera,
retinas branded with imagery
for the photographer's delight-
coloured pebbles, carved wooden animals,
tin cans, bones.....

....A Glass Sentinel
(though she isn't visible)
I can see right through her-
a vision of smokescreens
and subterfuge.

Past stumps of driftwood,
past the uncut grass,
a few flowers...

...to the fabricated backdrop
of a burning house, black smoke
rising
in
a
thin
stream.

At the open door -
The Guardian,
(I know her inside out)
unmoved,
(she didn't bat an eye)
defiant in a new skin,
a softer version-
The Mother protecting her children,
arms splayed, prepared
for fight or flight.

A russet flame
Licking her spine exhales
'Get out of my way!'
but she wasn't listening.

Smile fixed,
eyes of a phoenix,
a lion,
a raptor,
protector.
We all need feeding,
but not this way!

Throw me a cloth,
a napkin,
a man-size tissue
a lifeline!

She wanted this,
no, wished it-
this symbolism,
this burning of ironic portraits,
to clear the deck,
make way for new.

It shook the house,
its fate sealed behind closed doors.

I compose myself,
pull her back from the perilous edge,
gather her in my arms.

Fragments of shattered words
flutter in the ether.

What is real?
What is fiction?
A carbon copy of thousands?
A charred corner?

A forgotten candle?






WARNING:
'Eating fire' is a risky business
but can attract a large audience.

I.

Sunday mornings in Vancouver
even pigeons sleep in till 10 A.M.
Undaunted, I walk down Granville shortly before 8
seeking lox bagels with capers, red onions and cream cheese,
two breve lattes, and a newspaper. In truth,
panhandlers on the corner of Robson
have far greater chance of scoring.
An unexpectedly sunny February morn
suffices to spur me on. I am attuned to all vibration.
Breath of the awakening city
exhales manna upon the shop awnings.
Bagels rendered superfluous,
I scarf images instead ---
trolley buses, an umbrella shop, falafel stands ---
delicious Canadian visual cuisine.

                                 II.

Vancouver is a nymph. Of that I'm sure.
I hear flirtatious giggles trill
from darkened alleys between hotels.
Spotted her once across the street on Dunsmuir,
seated on a walk bench reading a Margaret Atwood novel.
Bus passed between us and she vanished.
Caught a later glimpse through the window
of a walk-up dim sum restaurant in Chinatown.
Flew the stairs, only to find an empty table and
discarded napkin smudged with candy pink lipstick.
She watches me.

                                                III.

Turns out there are no Sunday morning papers in Vancouver,
but I locate the bagels and espresso backtracking on Helmcken.
The barista smiles as I approach, sets down her Atwood novel.
I leave a Toonie in gratuity.
B.C. wind pushes ******* my turned back,
as I rush our breakfast back to the Executive.
A nymph goes roller-blading by toward False Creek.
The Gastown Steam Clock whistles that it's 10 A.M.
A flock of pigeons lifts in flight.

The inadequate bookshelf that sat near the door
that my sister used to call her own was
mostly made up of adolescent reads,
books better suited for preteen girls rather than
intellectually budding young ladies—
juvenile vocabularies and simple, non-complex
plot lines do little to craft and create
worldly, knowledgeable women.

I thought I must spring clean the
naiveté away and replace it with
the works of great authors like
Sylvia Plath
                        Simone de Beauvoir
                                                              Virginia Woolf
                        Margaret Atwood
Betty Friedan;
ingenious femme fatales that cut down
to the brittled bones of the misogynists
and burned their marrow along with the
ashes of bras and aprons and 350 degree oven heat.  

Growing up, to me, seemed like a wonderful epiphany
chock-full of ideas and opinions and
clever, ironic remarks that chased satirical witticisms
like felines to rodents and wolves to deer—
being an adult would guarantee me a say,
a vote
           prior 1920’s America
                                                  play dress up as a suffragette
           women’s rights
femininity personified by dolls in plastic houses.

To be eighteen-years-old,
the goal, the legality, the bright light at the end of the tunnel;
the official womanhood it would bestow upon me
seemed like something almost tangible
with the way that it loomed over my head.

Get good marks
graduate high school
travel back in time sixty years
meet a nice boy
become a “good wife”
have dinner ready by five
bear two beautiful heirs
clean up the messes left in the kitchen
fast-forward to the twenty-first century
go to a good college
find a stable career
settle down if the fancy strikes you
live non-docile and full of passion—
the parallelism of times are severely
di
    lap
          i
            dat
                 ­ ed.

1950’s America would never be a home for me
because I am much too wild to be contained.

Divorce is not
A bomb or a wrecking ball

It is before that, and warmer:

The midst of the storm, the midst
Of the war
The poorly patched walls
In silence where we stand
Distanced, avoiding contact

The midst of the growing fire
Where we reluctantly and with shame
At having given up after
So much

We are not trying to melt the ice

We are learning to make fire.

It's always the moment just before the gunshot.

Why do I remember it as summer all the time, then?

They gaze at me and see a chainsaw ****** just before it happened.
You think I'm not a goddess?
Try me.
This is a torch song.
Touch me and you'll burn.

THE MOMENT**

The moment when, after many years
of hard work and a long voyage
you stand in the centre of your room,
house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,
knowing at last how you got there,
and say, I own this,

is the same moment when the trees unloose
their soft arms from around you,
the birds take back their language,
the cliffs fissure and collapse,
the air moves back from you like a wave
and you can't breathe.

No, they whisper. You own nothing.
You were a visitor, time after time
climbing the hill, planting the flag, proclaiming.
We never belonged to you.
You never found us.
It was always the other way round.

The moment when, after many years
of hard work and a long voyage
you stand in the centre of your room,
house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,
knowing at last how you got there,
and say, I own this,

is the same moment when the trees unloose
their soft arms from around you,
the birds take back their language,
the cliffs fissure and collapse,
the air moves back from you like a wave
and you can't breathe.

No, they whisper. You own nothing.
You were a visitor, time after time
climbing the hill, planting the flag, proclaiming.
We never belonged to you.
You never found us.
It was always the other way round.

from Poetry of Presence An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems

The yuppies are by the
  Cotto Café, asking those
not to call them hipsters.
  An auburn feminist drinks
Mexican blend, black, while
  reading Margaret Atwood.

I gave up smoking, I say,
  about a month ago.
No one really listens, which
  I sometimes find comforting.

After I walk my isolation off,
  I stumble into a Taco Bell;
one of those hybrids: this time
  KFC. The cashier is curly in the
way that broken legs are curly.
  Her eyes are green but I dare
not objectify her, I hope I don't
  say out loud, because I fear
nothing more than being
  patronizing.

Construction loudly stutters
  and cars squeak and shush.
On this griddle of a sidewalk,
  I feel alone. Vehicles vroom
while I stand silent, a monument
  to my generation.

Took a trip on the Belafonte,
Bound with Cuba to forgotten Sanz.
Dinning on tin canned Del Monte,
A glass of Suntory always in hands.

Lloyd Faversham gifted salacious devices by John Cleese.
Used as props in Mike’s next gin stained showpiece.

The drum-line seemed irksome to J. Jonah.
He’d heard Zach Hill before.
Given limited time, despite the persona.
Interstellar fault found in a **** metaphor.

A swift change to an even more marketable sound.
Sparks didn’t fly when trying to appear profound.

Tiny teen dreams tending to tiny skirts.
Fidgeting with the hem-line.
Their just unintelligible flirts.
Stripping to avoid the breadline.

Dystopian fiction led to dissolution of fact
Can’t seem to see their world isn’t intact.

Atwood to Collins, Collins to a stupid ******* maze.
Alternate choice being a criminal thrill.
Simplistic fantasy whose only benefit is praise.
Popular opinion seems to be well over the hill.