#winnipeg
The way that Villard Street composes a tease I take every time,
as if I'll get all the way to Bozeman Creek;
drive my car into the culvert and wash away a year or 15...
Or how the trees on South Willson won't let me forget
the bookstore I loved before, back then--
_Back when?_
...when it was there. Never mind.
Leaves breeze-swaying/dancing to the rhythm of a laughter
caught bitter in a swelling throat.
I remember a reminder. 7th & College. I'm not supposed to be here
by now.
A future my youth had rejected.
Never signed up for.
There's a piece of my fingerprint removed; it's shaped like
Scott Street--like rain in Osborne Village.
There's a piece of my Gallatin ghostwalk that's the color of Polo Park Mall.
It makes a Province of sense, but States nothing at all.
I'm invisible here.
_Might be there too._
But my insides--my infrastructure--were built for Corydon Avenue
and the R.M. of East St. Paul.
You-me mailed a promise to me-you back then
_BACK. WHEN?_
NEVER MIND.
from this Cat pawed zip code to R2E 1B9 and then what?
_been a long time_
Been a while for brown eyes to run dry. Drag my blue through the mud on Pembina Highway,
Dry my tired center out and sew me up, I guess, with
a stitching
of 11th and Alderson. Try to debride these festering wounds
I gave myself, back in Kildonan or sliced open on Bird's Hill Road.
_Had long enough to heal, ain't ya?_
I guess I've had long enough
May 23, 2025
May 23, 2025 at 11:34 AM UTC
The date is printed orange
in the bottom right hand corner
of my very favorite picture.
It's from two-thousand and eight
And, as my cramping legs keep ambling
every gavel foot falls faster than
the one that fell before.
I'm wondering
where the Hell the years have gone.
You were all brown eyes and wide white smiles.
I was all youthful bravado.
As your laughter swelled to confidence,
I was sinking straight down to the bottom.
And the water rolled on past us,
Goose Creek
swelled with the Summer run-off...
Tell me where did all this time run off to?
The moon is looming large
in the hazing, ashed-out corner
of my wine-enchanted eyeball
on this too-typical night.
And every hyphen lends some extra space
to staggered breaths as I recall your face.
Now I'm spelling out
my own verdict:
defendant's moving to convict.
I don't know the final cost.
But I got enough memories
to say what future I still have,
well it sure ain't coming free.
I got enough memories now
that I don't know where I will be
when a year is just a yawn and a sigh,
and you're still lodged
deep down inside of me.
You were brown eyes' living confidence,
I was yellow, fading cowardice.
I know you were the better one,
and I've always been scraping the bottom.
And the water stalled beside us,
Red Riv-
-er choked with Winter ice blocks.
Don't know why I was so dumb and frozen.
But thanks
for believing
all those years.
Aug 16, 2016
Aug 16, 2016 at 11:36 AM UTC
They should still be singing stories, babe
about the fun we had.
Yeah, from the top of The Leg'--
throw an arm around your Golden Boy
dance them feet across the copper.
If those songs could take us back, I swear that I
would live out my days
inside of those strains
I'd keep my word this time.
and I
would arc across that place with you--
off The Leg' through Osborne Village,
through boutiques and record stores and maybe they
would hear us laughing at The Toad in the Hole.
Or we'd speed north, past Kildonan Park
'til they could hear us out in Lockport.
Hear us shout at Dubuc & Des Meurons
while they're waiting on their bus
to cut the frosty dusk with condensed exhaust
we could laugh right in their face.
I'd live inside those strains.
If they were singing about us from the top of The Leg'
we'd stream across St. Boniface Cathedral
and some young someones
running through hip deep snow in the cold
would pause and hear us.
We'd stir their soupy breath in the night,
sifting through our history.
If they forgot the words, it wouldn't matter.
Our verses: soft breathing, our choruses: laughter.
the sound of us moving through Exchange District taverns.
I want for them to start singing us songs
and I want a pint with you at The Yellow Dog.
No more 4 years of regrets and no more sad talk.
Just you and just me and maybe a walk through the city.
Jun 21, 2016
Jun 21, 2016 at 11:29 AM UTC
In Winnipeg
they dig the winter graves
in autumn
before the sun sleeps
and the ground freezes.
They guess the number
of holes to dig.
They respect the cold
and the winter dead.
Death prediction
is a fine art
in Winnipeg.
© M.L.Emmett
Nov 10, 2015
Nov 10, 2015 at 10:35 AM UTC
Trafficking in recollections
trading
neon nights for bygone days.
From ceiling lights to humming street signs
sealed records come untied.
Another time far from perfection
close enough
for mapping smiles,
covering miles and chasing laughs
out of throats
and into corner booths.
Grabbing coats, it's back out into night,
sleeves shining tables the moment we go,
then arms entwining. Voices warmed,
we sang together
*"...seemed so brief
but it wasn't / Now
I know I had plenty of time..."* (Weakerthans)
When was it we went out walking,
bundled up through Winnipeg?
Easter Break? Or January, drifting,
chilled
through wind or meltwash?
Calendars defy me now, though
every night recall the time,
the place,
the lights of Your Great City
flashing off your coffee eyes
and through the heavy, falling snowflakes
on a Spring or Winter night.
I'm traffic on chilly sidewalks
trading
CO2 for oxygen.
No cars disturb the late night silence,
shallow breaths or slow footsteps.
And, as I walk against the signal,
late October
snow obscures
street signs, dulling laughs from doors
of the bars
and late night coffee haunts.
Seems so far to my small West Side home.
Heels hitting pavement and face turned to stars,
arms hanging downward, my voice, drowned
mouths words, half-quiet
*"...dusk comes on
and I follow / the exhaust
from memory up to the end..."* (Weakerthans)
Nov 4, 2015
Nov 4, 2015 at 10:12 PM UTC
From the top of the Terminal,
your size was splayed out,
a grey **** carpet for the Red River Valley.
And The Forks right beneath
our weary walkers' feet
was a thick drop setting up in the center
of your ash grey forehead.
Traced a thumb down Taché and St. Mary's
to the peak of your left cheek on Fermor.
Your traffic light glance blinked us
right to a stop
as blue bomb thoughts and temperatures dropped
at the base of our minds
and your wide, widow's peak sky
formed a cold iron bruise 40 minutes past 5.
I've held your muddy diamond eyes
in mine, how many times?
And you'd sigh, sometimes
from your North End scar,
but the Assiniboine bends around Wellington Crescent,
a stifled, spiced laugh from the failed rebellion
of your Province's youth.
And you know I'm no novice
to the uncouth barbs of the Winter,
'cuz you wrapped asphalt arms
nice and tight
'round our shoulders.
Osborne & Morley for an A-frame embrace.
The face of a city, its wrinkles a sketch
of laugh line drives for donuts and coffee.
Crows' feet stretched through The Exchange.
We followed your grin
from
corner to corner,
from Richardson Airport
to Transcona Yards; one earring a lifeline,
the other, steel bones.
From your St. Norbert chin,
to your twin St. Paul crown,
we would wander,
kiss your River East temple
then call it a night.
I have names for every smile you gave me:
Vi-Ann in the Village,
The Toad in the Hole,
St. Boniface Cathedral, that first time
in deep snow.
I want you to know,
you frozen Great City,
your terrible beauty is written on me.
Each side-slanted grin I shared with your sidewalks
encircles my history now,
even still.
Fill an eye with 5 years
of joyous, drunk laughter
which seeds your purple sand sky with fog ghosts.
Still-frame your patchwork, frostbitten face--
the Perimeter Highway's a jaunt-angled toque;
keeps you warm--
I still wear you
when late Autumn light takes me back.
Mar 2, 2015
Mar 2, 2015 at 11:46 PM UTC
I know this foreign method
made my throbbing veins its home
'cuz the familiar's not familiar
and I'm not fine
lest I'm messed up on
wine.
And 9/10 of all the times
I've tried to crack a smile
since I lost you have
turned out as half-assed lies.
I wander streets, worn out,
while I wonder where you are
and what you're thinking about while
you drive down Henderson...
I'll try to dry out
from time to time
but fall back into bouts
internal I'm interred in
eternally--and I'll never win them.
I'll. Never. Win them.
Not without...
Sorry...
I meander through months while
you walk through my mind
--and I'm glad if you're happy?--
but you were quite angry
with me that night I took
and torched our collection
of 5 years' shared memories
QUITE ANGRY
with me.
And the things you said were mean
but you meant them.
And you were right
About how wrong I was
how bad I am,
and how I taste
like lemon lies
on the tongue.
You were right.
And I'm drunk.
And sad and sorry and selfish
and stupid and absorbed by a
salted skyline of cold, purple steel
every night.
It *****
You teach kids for a living,
about the age of 9.
Me? I try to dry out
now and then, time to time,
but it's hard.
And you're far.
And I'd still come if I could,
but it's hard
following this heart
when it's buried
at the confluence
of the Red and Assiniboine
Rivers.
Beneath The Forks...
And that heart? Like the ground above it,
it's covered
with ****** commercial architecture
and the clothing of bureaucracy,
but ****
we had fun there.
Didn't we...?
Jan 20, 2015
Jan 20, 2015 at 1:47 PM UTC
Gertrude, Stradbrook, River and Roslyn,
off of McMillan, my thoughts froze on Osborne
A drive through the Village on slippery streets
Bought records, drained pints
swallowed down summer nights
Back home in Wyoming--think I'll be fine
'til some night, filled to gills
trip through streets with a stranger
and sing "One Great City"
through swollen closed throat
And I remember...
Confusion Corner, commuting through cold streets
Watched you drive as the daylight died
I narrow my Focus,
you eased into traffic
The Assiniboine ran and was watched by Riel
January.
Johnson's Terminal.
London Fogs.
Took Yellow Dogs for long walks
and Exchanged now for then. Snapped pictures, again and again.
Snow up to my hips
Spent a night at St. Boniface
We cased a cathedral, your friends seemed to like me.
Lines ran from reserves, over oceans and borders.
Your hair ran down shoulders, brown waves for a blanket.
Winterpeg, Manitscoldout
Portage & Main
Shivering, smiling
at a Tavern Uniting with friends,
'til we took the King's Head...
We took the King's Head.
Long live the king.
January.
Magic Thailand.
Curry soup, curried thoughts thawing,
melting, falling from pickled brains,
through lips chapping
I donned my Tuxedo, chopped down Seven Oaks...
Your Catholic heart spoke
reached out for St. James.
St. Vital answered behind Fort Garry's walls...
Our hearts, they were neighbourhoods
And the streets were all salt.
Blistered paint on your blue '02 Focus
To the City Center of the continent's middle
Form a Perimeter
Frame a city
Bullseye, center, a Gold gilded Boy
he leans into sky, as they sing, as I hear.
The road North Ended--November, it was.
I think, one year prior, in Robin's Donuts
front doors swayed, on hinges that sighed metallic,
I caught your eyes--organic, unplanned--
through fog frosting lenses
Caught them, held on
Held your deep brown
In my gunmetal blue
Seasons will chase--haste to follow more seasons
White streaks to green
and the Red River runs.
When they score at the ballpark,
"Go Goldeyes!" the cheer sounds
Cheer. Cheer!
The Guess Who still ****
but the Jets completed their round trip
"Go, Jets, go!" so the cheer goes.
"Cheers!" Cheers like bells.
Bells
Pealing
Peeling like your sunburnt back
Bells
Ringing
Striking
Bells singing long
Bells sounding loudly from Grace Bible Church
baptizing Baltimore as it kisses Osborne
Bells ringing. Round sounds.
Round rings for fingertips touching
Bells
Round sounds that hang on my neck
and sing me to sleep every night--
remind me how badly you wanted those bells
I denied you.
They sing "Left and Leaving"
and show me old scars
they ring and peal and strike
and sing
unending.
I remember March of 2008
Dropping my toque in the mud-and-slush street
We took Pembina Highway
Ate Vietnamese.
I remember...
Confusion Corner,
Commuting through cold streets,
Watching you drive as the daylight died
In your blue '02 Focus
Ease us back into traffic,
The Assiniboine River.
And Louis Riel.
So tell me...
Comment-allez vous, ce soir?
Je ne suis pas comme ci, comme ça.
May 18, 2013
May 18, 2013 at 7:54 PM UTC
Silver ribbon Assiniboine
a sash for a city--a Ceinture Fléchée
tied into the Red just off Highway 1
You leak into the topsoil
in the place you call home
and come back up a street map
with fingerprint roads
I remember the way you'd trace these out on my back
with fingertip pencils--cartographer's hands--
Bird's Hill and Lag' and Portage and Corydon
laid 'em down in my veins
just under my skin
Where are you tonight, in your smiling Great City?
Crossing the bridge and inhaling the skyline?
Or walking the river in my iced over thoughts?
Maybe walking, mid-tempo, around KP mall?
Those hipsters in Osborne Village
and Wolsely
had nothing on us, did they?
Cooler than Main
on the 1st of the year
I trickled away
and I leaked into topsoil
enjambed between rhymes in apology poems.
An Irish Goodbye; a blip on the radar
stopped flashing to fade off the map of your streets.
Our voices still echo, our spectres still haunt
Dollaramas and sidewalks, Tim Horton's and pubs
Our hands still lace up--at least so in theory
Perimeter Highway's still traced on my back.
Here's hoping our avenues
meet again soon.
Here's hoping that luck can outrun shortcomings
one more time.
Jul 15, 2014
Jul 15, 2014 at 1:59 PM UTC
A day recedes,
I'll chase down one more night
A lamed and hobbling Spring
tries to outrun the tide
of all the misspent months
and all this wasted time
The northern breeze sings cold,
it sighs through tattered topsails
sea of questions waits.
schools of unanswered voicemails
My footfalls share the sidewalks,
steady,
sure. Still young but glimpsing old and stumbling
Walking outside
soaked lungs need some new air
I'm nervous and shaking
fold the map, don a blank stare
my days wearing on
fill 'em up with a fool's words
I'm saltwashed, stuck and
peeling paint off my memory
for now.
A day's been seized--
a metered length of life
Can't place a price on Fall
and can't outrun the tide
of these layered seasons
as his time unwinds
The eastern wind comes hard
and shreds through mended mainsails
river of answers dried
so ask the waving cattails.
His footfalls know the sidewalks
leaking
down sidestreets' asphalt tributaries
Walking around
A hitch in his slow gait
A ghost of our town
shuffles on with a fixed gaze,
his days playing out,
As he strides down the sidewalks
his life plays a film,
flashing bright on glazed eyeballs
And I'm southbound,
4 p.m. driving Orange Street
completely drowned--
--swore I woke up in Gimli,
Manitoba January
seared into my youthful memories
I'm freezerburnt
Autumn heat, don't leave me
I'll hold your hair if you're feeling sickly,
then drive back home.
Autumn heat, don't leave me now.
...Autumn heat, don't leave me now.
May 12, 2014
May 12, 2014 at 11:51 AM UTC