Maganda ka pa rin.
Kahit lagas ang halos lahat ng iyong ngipin
at pilas ang maganda **** pisngi.
Maganda ka pa rin.
Kahit hirap na kitang makilala.
Kahit hindi ko na makita ang ngiting dati ay para sa akin.
Maganda ka pa rin, aking asawa.
Magandang, maganda ka pa rin sa aking paningin,
mahal kong asawa.

Bigla ko tuloy naaalala,
noong hindi pa tayo magkakilala.
Palagi kita tinitignan. Mula sa malayo.
Sa likod ng mga streamer. Sa likod ng mga banner.
Parang stalker. Tinitignan kita.

Kaya naman parang umaakyat sa hagdanan ang aking kaligayahan
nang ikaw ay magpasyang mag-fulltime.
Nang tanggapin mo ang aking laking-bukid na pag-ibig,
At mas lalo, siyempre nang ikasal tayo sa opisina ng KOMPRA.

Pero, mahal na kasama, ngayong gabi,
ibig sana kitang sarilinin.
Tayo lang sana ng mga anak natin.
Pwede bang kahit ngayong gabi ay maipagdamot ka namin?
Pwede bang dito ka muna sa amin?

Oo, alam ko,
di mo iyon nanaisin. Sasabihin mo pihado, sigurado.
Pamilya mo rin sila- manggagawa, magsasaka, mga kasama.

Kaya't kasama nila,
bubuhayin ko ang iyong alaala.
Bubuhayin namin ang iyong mga alaala.

Ang huling araw na ikaw ay nakasama.
Ang huling text message na iyong pinadala.

Ang iyong mga aral at mga hamon.
At batid naming lahat saan ka man naroroon.
Tiyak namin san ka man naroroon.

Tumatawa ka nang malakas,
tinatawanan mo ang mga ungas.
Mga ungas sila. Bigo sila. Epic fail sila.
Nabigo silang ika'y patahimikin.
Nabigo silang pag-aaklas natin ay pahupain.
Akala nila nagwakas,
Pero tumutupok pa rin ang sinindihan **** ningas.
At sa muling pagbalikwas ng malayang bukas.
I-aabot natin sa tarangkahan ng kanilang mga kaluluwa ang wakas.

I WAS born on the prairie and the milk of its wheat, the red of its clover, the eyes of its women, gave me a song and a slogan.

Here the water went down, the icebergs slid with gravel, the gaps and the valleys hissed, and the black loam came, and the yellow sandy loam.
Here between the sheds of the Rocky Mountains and the Appalachians, here now a morning star fixes a fire sign over the timber claims and cow pastures, the corn belt, the cotton belt, the cattle ranches.
Here the gray geese go five hundred miles and back with a wind under their wings honking the cry for a new home.
Here I know I will hanker after nothing so much as one more sunrise or a sky moon of fire doubled to a river moon of water.

The prairie sings to me in the forenoon and I know in the night I rest easy in the prairie arms, on the prairie heart..    .    .
        After the sunburn of the day
        handling a pitchfork at a hayrack,
        after the eggs and biscuit and coffee,
        the pearl-gray haystacks
        in the gloaming
        are cool prayers
        to the harvest hands.

In the city among the walls the overland passenger train is choked and the pistons hiss and the wheels curse.
On the prairie the overland flits on phantom wheels and the sky and the soil between them muffle the pistons and cheer the wheels..    .    .
I am here when the cities are gone.
I am here before the cities come.
I nourished the lonely men on horses.
I will keep the laughing men who ride iron.
I am dust of men.

The running water babbled to the deer, the cottontail, the gopher.
You came in wagons, making streets and schools,
Kin of the ax and rifle, kin of the plow and horse,
Singing Yankee Doodle, Old Dan Tucker, Turkey in the Straw,
You in the coonskin cap at a log house door hearing a lone wolf howl,
You at a sod house door reading the blizzards and chinooks let loose from Medicine Hat,
I am dust of your dust, as I am brother and mother
To the copper faces, the worker in flint and clay,
The singing women and their sons a thousand years ago
Marching single file the timber and the plain.

I hold the dust of these amid changing stars.
I last while old wars are fought, while peace broods mother-like,
While new wars arise and the fresh killings of young men.
I fed the boys who went to France in great dark days.
Appomattox is a beautiful word to me and so is Valley Forge and the Marne and Verdun,
I who have seen the red births and the red deaths
Of sons and daughters, I take peace or war, I say nothing and wait.

Have you seen a red sunset drip over one of my cornfields, the shore of night stars, the wave lines of dawn up a wheat valley?
Have you heard my threshing crews yelling in the chaff of a strawpile and the running wheat of the wagonboards, my cornhuskers, my harvest hands hauling crops, singing dreams of women, worlds, horizons?.    .    .
        Rivers cut a path on flat lands.
        The mountains stand up.
        The salt oceans press in
        And push on the coast lines.
        The sun, the wind, bring rain
        And I know what the rainbow writes across the east or west in a half-circle:
        A love-letter pledge to come again..    .    .
      Towns on the Soo Line,
      Towns on the Big Muddy,
      Laugh at each other for cubs
      And tease as children.

Omaha and Kansas City, Minneapolis and St. Paul, sisters in a house together, throwing slang, growing up.
Towns in the Ozarks, Dakota wheat towns, Wichita, Peoria, Buffalo, sisters throwing slang, growing up..    .    .
Out of prairie-brown grass crossed with a streamer of wigwam smoke-out of a smoke pillar, a blue promise-out of wild ducks woven in greens and purples-
Here I saw a city rise and say to the peoples round world: Listen, I am strong, I know what I want.
Out of log houses and stumps-canoes stripped from tree-sides-flatboats coaxed with an ax from the timber claims-in the years when the red and the white men met-the houses and streets rose.

A thousand red men cried and went away to new places for corn and women: a million white men came and put up skyscrapers, threw out rails and wires, feelers to the salt sea: now the smokestacks bite the skyline with stub teeth.

In an early year the call of a wild duck woven in greens and purples: now the riveter's chatter, the police patrol, the song-whistle of the steamboat.

To a man across a thousand years I offer a handshake.
I say to him: Brother, make the story short, for the stretch of a thousand years is short..    .    .
What brothers these in the dark?
What eaves of skyscrapers against a smoke moon?
These chimneys shaking on the lumber shanties
When the coal boats plow by on the river-
The hunched shoulders of the grain elevators-
The flame sprockets of the sheet steel mills
And the men in the rolling mills with their shirts off
Playing their flesh arms against the twisting wrists of steel:
        what brothers these
        in the dark
        of a thousand years?.    .    .
A headlight searches a snowstorm.
A funnel of white light shoots from over the pilot of the Pioneer Limited crossing Wisconsin.

In the morning hours, in the dawn,
The sun puts out the stars of the sky
And the headlight of the Limited train.

The fireman waves his hand to a country school teacher on a bobsled.
A boy, yellow hair, red scarf and mittens, on the bobsled, in his lunch box a pork chop sandwich and a V of gooseberry pie.

The horses fathom a snow to their knees.
Snow hats are on the rolling prairie hills.
The Mississippi bluffs wear snow hats..    .    .
Keep your hogs on changing corn and mashes of grain,
    O farmerman.
    Cram their insides till they waddle on short legs
    Under the drums of bellies, hams of fat.
    **** your hogs with a knife slit under the ear.
    Hack them with cleavers.
    Hang them with hooks in the hind legs..    .    .
A wagonload of radishes on a summer morning.
Sprinkles of dew on the crimson-purple *****.
The farmer on the seat dangles the reins on the rumps of dapple-gray horses.
The farmer's daughter with a basket of eggs dreams of a new hat to wear to the county fair..    .    .
On the left-and right-hand side of the road,
        Marching corn-
I saw it knee high weeks ago-now it is head high-tassels of red silk creep at the ends of the ears..    .    .
I am the prairie, mother of men, waiting.
They are mine, the threshing crews eating beefsteak, the farmboys driving steers to the railroad cattle pens.
They are mine, the crowds of people at a Fourth of July basket picnic, listening to a lawyer read the Declaration of Independence, watching the pinwheels and Roman candles at night, the young men and women two by two hunting the bypaths and kissing bridges.
They are mine, the horses looking over a fence in the frost of late October saying good-morning to the horses hauling wagons of rutabaga to market.
They are mine, the old zigzag rail fences, the new barb wire..    .    .
The cornhuskers wear leather on their hands.
There is no let-up to the wind.
Blue bandannas are knotted at the ruddy chins.

Falltime and winter apples take on the smolder of the five-o'clock November sunset: falltime, leaves, bonfires, stubble, the old things go, and the earth is grizzled.
The land and the people hold memories, even among the anthills and the angleworms, among the toads and woodroaches-among gravestone writings rubbed out by the rain-they keep old things that never grow old.

The frost loosens corn husks.
The Sun, the rain, the wind
        loosen corn husks.
The men and women are helpers.
They are all cornhuskers together.
I see them late in the western evening
        in a smoke-red dust..    .    .
The phantom of a yellow rooster flaunting a scarlet comb, on top of a dung pile crying hallelujah to the streaks of daylight,
The phantom of an old hunting dog nosing in the underbrush for muskrats, barking at a **** in a treetop at midnight, chewing a bone, chasing his tail round a corncrib,
The phantom of an old workhorse taking the steel point of a plow across a forty-acre field in spring, hitched to a harrow in summer, hitched to a wagon among cornshocks in fall,
These phantoms come into the talk and wonder of people on the front porch of a farmhouse late summer nights.
"The shapes that are gone are here," said an old man with a cob pipe in his teeth one night in Kansas with a hot wind on the alfalfa..    .    .
Look at six eggs
In a mockingbird's nest.

Listen to six mockingbirds
Flinging follies of O-be-joyful
Over the marshes and uplands.

Look at songs
Hidden in eggs..    .    .
When the morning sun is on the trumpet-vine blossoms, sing at the kitchen pans: Shout All Over God's Heaven.
When the rain slants on the potato hills and the sun plays a silver shaft on the last shower, sing to the bush at the backyard fence: Mighty Lak a Rose.
When the icy sleet pounds on the storm windows and the house lifts to a great breath, sing for the outside hills: The Ole Sheep Done Know the Road, the Young Lambs Must Find the Way..    .    .
Spring slips back with a girl face calling always: "Any new songs for me? Any new songs?"

O prairie girl, be lonely, singing, dreaming, waiting-your lover comes-your child comes-the years creep with toes of April rain on new-turned sod.
O prairie girl, whoever leaves you only crimson poppies to talk with, whoever puts a good-by kiss on your lips and never comes back-
There is a song deep as the falltime redhaws, long as the layer of black loam we go to, the shine of the morning star over the corn belt, the wave line of dawn up a wheat valley..    .    .
O prairie mother, I am one of your boys.
I have loved the prairie as a man with a heart shot full of pain over love.
Here I know I will hanker after nothing so much as one more sunrise or a sky moon of fire doubled to a river moon of water..    .    .
I speak of new cities and new people.
I tell you the past is a bucket of ashes.
I tell you yesterday is a wind gone down,
  a sun dropped in the west.
I tell you there is nothing in the world
  only an ocean of to-morrows,
  a sky of to-morrows.

I am a brother of the cornhuskers who say
  at sundown:
        To-morrow is a day.

So all day long the noise of battle roll'd
Among the mountains by the winter sea;
Until King Arthur's table, man by man,
Had fallen in Lyonnesse about their Lord,
King Arthur: then, because his wound was deep,
The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him,
Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights,
And bore him to a chapel nigh the field,
A broken chancel with a broken cross,
That stood on a dark strait of barren land.
On one side lay the ocean, and on one
Lay a great water, and the moon was full.

      Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
"The sequel of to-day unsolders all
The goodliest fellowship of famous knights
Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep
They sleep--the men I loved. I think that we
Shall never more, at any future time,
Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds,
Walking about the gardens and the halls
Of Camelot, as in the days that were.
I perish by this people which I made,--
Tho' Merlin sware that I should come again
To rule once more--but let what will be, be,
I am so deeply smitten thro' the helm
That without help I cannot last till morn.
Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur,
Which was my pride: for thou rememberest how
In those old days, one summer noon, an arm
Rose up from out the ***** of the lake,
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
Holding the sword--and how I row'd across
And took it, and have worn it, like a king:
And, wheresoever I am sung or told
In aftertime, this also shall be known:
But now delay not: take Excalibur,
And fling him far into the middle mere:
Watch what thou seest, and lightly bring me word."

      To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere:
"It is not meet, Sir King, to leave thee thus,
Aidless, alone, and smitten thro' the helm.
A little thing may harm a wounded man.
Yet I thy hest will all perform at full,
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word."

      So saying, from the ruin'd shrine he stept
And in the moon athwart the place of tombs,
Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men,
Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping down
By zigzag paths, and juts of pointed rock,
Came on the shining levels of the lake.

      There drew he forth the brand Excalibur,
And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon,
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth
And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt:
For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks,
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth work
Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long
That both his eyes were dazzled, as he stood,
This way and that dividing the swift mind,
In act to throw: but at the last it seem'd
Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd
There in the many-knotted water-flags,
That whistled stiff and dry about the marge.
So strode he back slow to the wounded King.

      Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
"Hast thou perform'd my mission which I gave?
What is it thou hast seen, or what hast heard?"

      And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
"I heard the ripple washing in the reeds,
And the wild water lapping on the crag."

      To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale:
"Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy name,
Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd
Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight:
For surer sign had follow'd, either hand,
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere.
This is a shameful thing for men to lie.
Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again
As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing
I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word."

      Then went Sir Bedivere the second time
Across the ridge, and paced beside the mere,
Counting the dewy pebbles, fixed in thought;
But when he saw the wonder of the hilt,
How curiously and strangely chased, he smote
His palms together, and he cried aloud,

      "And if indeed I cast the brand away,
Surely a precious thing, one worthy note,
Should thus be lost forever from the earth,
Which might have pleased the eyes of many men.
What good should follow this, if this were done?
What harm, undone? deep harm to disobey,
Seeing obedience is the bond of rule.
Were it well to obey then, if a king demand
An act unprofitable, against himself?
The King is sick, and knows not what he does.
What record, or what relic of my lord
Should be to aftertime, but empty breath
And rumours of a doubt? but were this kept,
Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings,
Some one might show it at a joust of arms,
Saying, 'King Arthur's sword, Excalibur,
Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake;
Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the deeps
Upon the hidden bases of the hills.'
So might some old man speak in the aftertime
To all the people, winning reverence.
But now much honour and much fame were lost."

      So spake he, clouded with his own conceit,
And hid Excalibur the second time,
And so strode back slow to the wounded King.

      Then spoke King Arthur, breathing heavily:
"What is it thou hast seen, or what hast heard?"

      And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
"I heard the water lapping on the crag,
And the long ripple washing in the reeds."

      To whom replied King Arthur, much in wrath:
"Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue,
Unknightly, traitor-hearted! Woe is me!
Authority forgets a dying king,
Laid widow'd of the power in his eye
That bow'd the will. I see thee what thou art,
For thou, the latest-left of all my knights,
In whom should meet the offices of all,
Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt;
Either from lust of gold, or like a girl
Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes.
Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice,
And the third time may prosper, get thee hence:
But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur,
I will arise and slay thee with my hands."

      Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran,
And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged
Among the bulrush-beds, and clutch'd the sword,
And strongly wheel'd and threw it. The great brand
Made lightnings in the splendour of the moon,
And flashing round and round, and whirl'd in an arch,
Shot like a streamer of the northern morn,
Seen where the moving isles of winter shock
By night, with noises of the northern sea.
So flash'd and fell the brand Excalibur:
But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
And caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him
Three times, and drew him under in the mere.
And lightly went the other to the King.

      Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker breath:
"Now see I by thine eyes that this is done.
Speak out: what is it thou hast heard, or seen?"

      And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
"Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems
Should blind my purpose, for I never saw,
Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die,
Not tho' I live three lives of mortal men,
So great a miracle as yonder hilt.
Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling him;
But when I look'd again, behold an arm,
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
That caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him
Three times, and drew him under in the mere."

      And answer made King Arthur, breathing hard:
"My end draws nigh; 't is time that I were gone.
Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight,
And bear me to the margin; yet I fear
My wound hath taken cold, and I shall die."

      So saying, from the pavement he half rose,
Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm,
And looking wistfully with wide blue eyes
As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere
Remorsefully regarded thro' his tears,
And would have spoken, but he found not words,
Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee,
O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands,
And rising bore him thro' the place of tombs.

      But, as he walk'd, King Arthur panted hard,
Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed
When all the house is mute. So sigh'd the King
Muttering and murmuring at his ear, "Quick, quick!
I fear it is too late, and I shall die."
But the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge,
Clothed with his breath, and looking, as he walk'd
Larger than human on the frozen hills.
He heard the deep behind him, and a cry
Before. His own thought drove him like a goad.
Dry clash'd his harness in the icy caves
And barren chasms, and all to left and right
The bare black cliff clang'd round him, as he based
His feet on juts of slippery crag that rang
Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels--
And on a sudden, lo! the level lake,
And the long glories of the winter moon.

      Then saw they how there hove a dusky barge
Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern,
Beneath them; and descending they were ware
That all the decks were dense with stately forms
Black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream--by these
Three Queens with crowns of gold--and from them rose
A cry that shiver'd to the tingling stars,
And, as it were one voice, an agony
Of lamentation, like a wind, that shrills
All night in a waste land, where no one comes,
Or hath come, since the making of the world.

      Then murmur'd Arthur, "Place me in the barge,"
And to the barge they came. There those three Queens
Put forth their hands, and took the King, and wept.
But she that rose the tallest of them all
And fairest, laid his head upon her lap,
And loosed the shatter'd casque, and chafed his hands,
And call'd him by his name, complaining loud
And dropping bitter tears against his brow
Striped with dark blood: for all his face was white
And colourless, and like the wither'd moon
Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east;
And all his greaves and cuisses dash'd with drops
Of onset; and the light and lustrous curls--
That made his forehead like a rising sun
High from the dais-throne--were parch'd with dust;
Or, clotted into points and hanging loose,
Mix'd with the knightly growth that fringed his lips.
So like a shatter'd column lay the King;
Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest,
From spur to plume a star of tournament,
Shot thro' the lists at Camelot, and charged
Before the eyes of ladies and of kings.

      Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere:
"Ah! my Lord Arthur, whither shall I go?
Where shall I hide my forehead and my eyes?
For now I see the true old times are dead,
When every morning brought a noble chance,
And every chance brought out a noble knight.
Such times have been not since the light that led
The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh.
But now the whole ROUND TABLE is dissolved
Which was an image of the mighty world;
And I, the last, go forth companionless,
And the days darken round me, and the years,
Among new men, strange faces, other minds."

      And slowly answer'd Arthur from the barge:
"The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
And God fulfils Himself in many ways,
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me?
I have lived my life, and that which I have done
May He within Himself make pure! but thou,
If thou shouldst never see my face again,
Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice
Rise like a fountain for me night and day.
For what are men better than sheep or goats
That nourish a blind life within the brain,
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
Both for themselves and those who call them friend?
For so the whole round earth is every way
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God.
But now farewell. I am going a long way
With these thou seest--if indeed I go--
(For all my mind is clouded with a doubt)
To the island-valley of Avilion;
Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow,
Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies
Deep-meadow'd, happy, fair with orchard-lawns
And bowery hollows crown'd with summer sea,
Where I will heal me of my grievous wound."

      So said he, and the barge with oar and sail
Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted swan
That, fluting a wild carol ere her death,
Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood
With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere
Revolving many memories, till the hull
Look'd one black dot against the verge of dawn,
And on the mere the wailing died away.

If you had to pick one adjective to sum up Michael Kors' collection at last month's New York Fashion Week, a good bet might be "feathery."

The designer was going for "the flirty freedom of things that move," to quote his production notes, and there were flirty feathers on at least 10 of the looks he sent down the runway - starting with feathers adorning a pair of jeans, and moving to feathers on a houndstooth tweed coat, on a denim or tweed skirt, and on black silk for ultimate evening effect.

There also were plenty of sequins, adding a very bright sheen to some of the fashions, especially a silver sequin embroidered "streamer" dress, with the hem cut into strips that indeed looked like streamers, and also a pair of seriously glistening silver metallic stretch tulle pants.

This is Kors' flagship collection, not his more accessibly priced secondary line.

Kors always has a healthy celebrity contingent at his fashion shows, and February's event was no exception: Blake Lively and Jennifer Hudson were among the front-row guests. They were there to witness an anniversary of sorts for Kors.

"I'm not one for anniversaries and I'm really not a big kind of looking-over-my-shoulder kind of guy," Kors said in a backstage interview. "But when I started designing this I realized, oh my God, this is my 35th fall collection. That's crazy!"

Kors added that as he reflected on the milestone, he realized the most important thing was to keep his fashion fun.

"I wanted this to be full of fun and charm," he said. "So it's very flirty, short, leggy, not a gown in sight. All the rules are broken because stylish people break the rules ... The seasons are crazy anyway. So when the weather's terrible, don't you want to put on a fabulous apple green coat to change your spirits? Don't you want to wear tweed with flowers? Don't you want to put feathers on flannel? Wear flats at night? Wear metallic for a day?"

From his sunglasses to his gold glitter pumps, Kors' collection exuded fun, not fuss. Even a denim skirt is luxe, when covered in feathers. A hoodie adds reality to a silver sequin cocktail dress. And who doesn't love handbags the colors of jelly beans.

CAVALLI'S DECADENCE

MILAN - Even while venturing back in time to the Belle Epoque era, Peter Dundas' latest collection for Roberto Cavalliremains rooted in the rock 'n' roll '60s and '70s. His collection bowed during Milan Fashion Week last month.

The languid looks were strong on glamour and workmanship, from the ephemeral sheer beaded evening dresses in pale shades to the colorful patchwork fur coats worthy of any rock star: art nouveau meets Janis Joplin.

''Decadence, superstition, mysticism, Gustav Klimt, Aubrey Beardsley - things that give me a kick," Dundas said backstage, describing his inspirations.

He said the Roberto Cavalli woman for the season is ''a little wild and instinctive."

The Cavalli animal print for next winter is tiger, in long skirts and short bomber jackets, while denim gets its due with a long trailing coat and flared embroidered jeans. Looks were finished with long scarves tied casually around the neck, makeup hastily done and hair loose and natural.

Notwithstanding the labor involved in his creations, Dundas says he would like to see his collections get into stores more quickly than the current system permits.

''I wish I could. I am working on it," Dundas.

DIOR'S PARISIENNE

PARIS - Vogue fashion doyenne Anna Wintour, former French first lady Bernadette Chirac and Chinese actress Liu Yifeiwere among the celebrities on the front row of the Dior show held in an annex inside the picturesque Rodin Museumgardens in January.

In the clothes, the "spontaneous, relaxed Parisienne of today" mixed with the iconic styles of the 1940s and 1950s.

High-cut post-War shoes with occasional retro ankle bows accessorized embroidered silk gowns in freestyle volumes - often with "sensual, bare" accentuated shoulders. A couple of flapper-style lace, chiffon and tulle look also evoked the joyful feeling of the 1920s - the period between the two World Wars.

Dior's studio team of designers also set about experimenting with the famed "bar jacket" - it "changes appearance depending on whether it is worn closed or loose," said the program notes.

It thus came in myriad forms: in tight, embroidered black wool, loose and white, open to expose the breast sensually, oversized and masculine, or as a beautiful dark navy wool coat.

There were also traces of the historical musings of past creative directors - such as Galliano and Simons - set off nicely in one look off-white wool "bar" jacket interpretation with flappy 18th-century cuffs.Read more at:www.marieaustralia.com/bridesmaid-dresses | www.marieaustralia.com/short-formal-dresses

when the streamer met a dreamer
all this must be really real
your game puts all the guys to shame
your voice feels like i really feel

when you called me your wild daisy
i hope all the others heard
baby i'm not that crazy
baby don't take the other's word

if only he could see her
he'd see who she really was
he wouldn't wanna be her
nobody really does

High on a mountain of enamell’d head—
Such as the drowsy shepherd on his bed
Of giant pasturage lying at his ease,
Raising his heavy eyelid, starts and sees
With many a mutter’d “hope to be forgiven”
What time the moon is quadrated in Heaven—
Of rosy head, that towering far away
Into the sunlit ether, caught the ray
Of sunken suns at eve—at noon of night,
While the moon danc’d with the fair stranger light—
Uprear’d upon such height arose a pile
Of gorgeous columns on th’ uuburthen’d air,
Flashing from Parian marble that twin smile
Far down upon the wave that sparkled there,
And nursled the young mountain in its lair.
Of molten stars their pavement, such as fall
Thro’ the ebon air, besilvering the pall
Of their own dissolution, while they die—
Adorning then the dwellings of the sky.
A dome, by linked light from Heaven let down,
Sat gently on these columns as a crown—
A window of one circular diamond, there,
Look’d out above into the purple air
And rays from God shot down that meteor chain
And hallow’d all the beauty twice again,
Save when, between th’ Empyrean and that ring,
Some eager spirit flapp’d his dusky wing.
But on the pillars Seraph eyes have seen
The dimness of this world: that grayish green
That Nature loves the best for Beauty’s grave
Lurk’d in each cornice, round each architrave—
And every sculptured cherub thereabout
That from his marble dwelling peered out,
Seem’d earthly in the shadow of his niche—
Achaian statues in a world so rich?
Friezes from Tadmor and Persepolis—
From Balbec, and the stilly, clear abyss
Of beautiful Gomorrah! Oh, the wave
Is now upon thee—but too late to save!
Sound loves to revel in a summer night:
Witness the murmur of the gray twilight
That stole upon the ear, in Eyraco,
Of many a wild star-gazer long ago—
That stealeth ever on the ear of him
Who, musing, gazeth on the distance dim,
And sees the darkness coming as a cloud—
Is not its form—its voice—most palpable and loud?
But what is this?—it cometh—and it brings
A music with it—’tis the rush of wings—
A pause—and then a sweeping, falling strain,
And Nesace is in her halls again.
From the wild energy of wanton haste
Her cheeks were flushing, and her lips apart;
The zone that clung around her gentle waist
Had burst beneath the heaving of her heart.
Within the centre of that hall to breathe
She paus’d and panted, Zanthe! all beneath,
The fairy light that kiss’d her golden hair
And long’d to rest, yet could but sparkle there!

Young flowers were whispering in melody
To happy flowers that night—and tree to tree;
Fountains were gushing music as they fell
In many a star-lit grove, or moon-light dell;
Yet silence came upon material things—
Fair flowers, bright waterfalls and angel wings—
And sound alone that from the spirit sprang
Bore burthen to the charm the maiden sang:

  “Neath blue-bell or streamer—
    Or tufted wild spray
  That keeps, from the dreamer,
    The moonbeam away—
  Bright beings! that ponder,
    With half-closing eyes,
  On the stars which your wonder
    Hath drawn from the skies,
  Till they glance thro’ the shade, and
    Come down to your brow
  Like—eyes of the maiden
    Who calls on you now—
  Arise! from your dreaming
    In violet bowers,
  To duty beseeming
    These star-litten hours—
  And shake from your tresses
    Encumber’d with dew

  The breath of those kisses
    That cumber them too—
  (O! how, without you, Love!
    Could angels be blest?)
  Those kisses of true love
    That lull’d ye to rest!
  Up! shake from your wing
    Each hindering thing:
  The dew of the night—
    It would weigh down your flight;
  And true love caresses—
    O! leave them apart!
  They are light on the tresses,
    But lead on the heart.

  Ligeia! Ligeia!
    My beautiful one!
  Whose harshest idea
    Will to melody run,
  O! is it thy will
    On the breezes to toss?
  Or, capriciously still,
    Like the lone Albatross,
  Incumbent on night
    (As she on the air)
  To keep watch with delight
    On the harmony there?

  Ligeia! wherever
    Thy image may be,
  No magic shall sever
    Thy music from thee.
  Thou hast bound many eyes
    In a dreamy sleep—
  But the strains still arise
    Which thy vigilance keep—

  The sound of the rain
    Which leaps down to the flower,
  And dances again
    In the rhythm of the shower—
  The murmur that springs
    From the growing of grass
  Are the music of things—
    But are modell’d, alas!
  Away, then, my dearest,
    O! hie thee away
  To springs that lie clearest
    Beneath the moon-ray—
  To lone lake that smiles,
    In its dream of deep rest,
  At the many star-isles
  That enjewel its breast—
  Where wild flowers, creeping,
    Have mingled their shade,
  On its margin is sleeping
    Full many a maid—
  Some have left the cool glade, and
    Have slept with the bee—
  Arouse them, my maiden,
    On moorland and lea—

  Go! breathe on their slumber,
    All softly in ear,
  The musical number
    They slumber’d to hear—
  For what can awaken
    An angel so soon
  Whose sleep hath been taken
    Beneath the cold moon,
  As the spell which no slumber
    Of witchery may test,
  The rhythmical number
    Which lull’d him to rest?”

Spirits in wing, and angels to the view,
A thousand seraphs burst th’ Empyrean thro’,
Young dreams still hovering on their drowsy flight—
Seraphs in all but “Knowledge,” the keen light
That fell, refracted, thro’ thy bounds afar,
O death! from eye of God upon that star;
Sweet was that error—sweeter still that death—
Sweet was that error—ev’n with us the breath
Of Science dims the mirror of our joy—
To them ’twere the Simoom, and would destroy—
For what (to them) availeth it to know
That Truth is Falsehood—or that Bliss is Woe?
Sweet was their death—with them to die was rife
With the last ecstasy of satiate life—
Beyond that death no immortality—
But sleep that pondereth and is not “to be”—
And there—oh! may my weary spirit dwell—
Apart from Heaven’s Eternity—and yet how far from Hell!

What guilty spirit, in what shrubbery dim
Heard not the stirring summons of that hymn?
But two: they fell: for heaven no grace imparts
To those who hear not for their beating hearts.
A maiden-angel and her seraph-lover—
O! where (and ye may seek the wide skies over)
Was Love, the blind, near sober Duty known?
Unguided Love hath fallen—’mid “tears of perfect moan.”

He was a goodly spirit—he who fell:
A wanderer by mossy-mantled well—
A gazer on the lights that shine above—
A dreamer in the moonbeam by his love:
What wonder? for each star is eye-like there,
And looks so sweetly down on Beauty’s hair—
And they, and ev’ry mossy spring were holy
To his love-haunted heart and melancholy.
The night had found (to him a night of wo)
Upon a mountain crag, young Angelo—
Beetling it bends athwart the solemn sky,
And scowls on starry worlds that down beneath it lie.
Here sate he with his love—his dark eye bent
With eagle gaze along the firmament:
Now turn’d it upon her—but ever then
It trembled to the orb of EARTH again.

“Ianthe, dearest, see! how dim that ray!
How lovely ’tis to look so far away!
She seemed not thus upon that autumn eve
I left her gorgeous halls—nor mourned to leave,
That eve—that eve—I should remember well—
The sun-ray dropped, in Lemnos with a spell
On th’ Arabesque carving of a gilded hall
Wherein I sate, and on the draperied wall—
And on my eyelids—O, the heavy light!
How drowsily it weighed them into night!
On flowers, before, and mist, and love they ran
With Persian Saadi in his Gulistan:
But O, that light!—I slumbered—Death, the while,
Stole o’er my senses in that lovely isle
So softly that no single silken hair
Awoke that slept—or knew that he was there.

“The last spot of Earth’******I trod upon
Was a proud temple called the Parthenon;
More beauty clung around her columned wall
Then even thy glowing ***** beats withal,
And when old Time my wing did disenthral
Thence sprang I—as the eagle from his tower,
And years I left behind me in an hour.
What time upon her airy bounds I hung,
One half the garden of her globe was flung
Unrolling as a chart unto my view—
Tenantless cities of the desert too!
Ianthe, beauty crowded on me then,
And half I wished to be again of men.”

“My Angelo! and why of them to be?
A brighter dwelling-place is here for thee—
And greener fields than in yon world above,
And woman’s loveliness—and passionate love.”
“But list, Ianthe! when the air so soft
Failed, as my pennoned spirit leapt aloft,
Perhaps my brain grew dizzy—but the world
I left so late was into chaos hurled,
Sprang from her station, on the winds apart,
And rolled a flame, the fiery Heaven athwart.
Methought, my sweet one, then I ceased to soar,
And fell—not swiftly as I rose before,
But with a downward, tremulous motion thro’
Light, brazen rays, this golden star unto!
Nor long the measure of my falling hours,
For nearest of all stars was thine to ours—
Dread star! that came, amid a night of mirth,
A red Daedalion on the timid Earth.”

“We came—and to thy Earth—but not to us
Be given our lady’s bidding to discuss:
We came, my love; around, above, below,
Gay fire-fly of the night we come and go,
Nor ask a reason save the angel-nod
She grants to us as granted by her God—
But, Angelo, than thine gray Time unfurled
Never his fairy wing o’er fairer world!
Dim was its little disk, and angel eyes
Alone could see the phantom in the skies,
When first Al Aaraaf knew her course to be
Headlong thitherward o’er the starry sea—
But when its glory swelled upon the sky,
As glowing Beauty’s bust beneath man’s eye,
We paused before the heritage of men,
And thy star trembled—as doth Beauty then!”

Thus in discourse, the lovers whiled away
The night that waned and waned and brought no day.
They fell: for Heaven to them no hope imparts
Who hear not for the beating of their hearts.

My Maypole mind unravels
reverses centrifugal force
its streamer shreds of ribbons
spinning backwards
in one grand and splendid rush.

Mind loosened and snapped
tatters
fluttering free
electric after-images
of me.


© M.L.Emmett

The purple dancer runs along
With ashen streamer flowing
It tails the dancer as the song
Climaxes, ever knowing

The moves are clear, concise, complete
And audience views the tale
The streamer obeys eager feet
The dancer does not fail

The purple dancer's feet attack
And lovingly embrace
The floor of fibrous white in stack
The medium of this place

And when at last the dance is done
The ashen streamer taken
Illumination: Mind has won
And through this, world has shaken

With time there's nothing visual. . .
Only things. . . due after some fact. . .
What we consider is most purest of things. . .
to some, it's just white hurricane crack. . .
I consider myself. . .
With time all illusions. . . set to the side. . .
Life is pure. . . without a blanket of time. .
We consider,. . . we all make it in rhyme. . .
Someway . . .or another. . .
The world is got so much more then to bother. . .each One another. . .
Then to share with joyful expression,. . . that time but allows us. . .
To the fullest extent,. . . time as illusion. . .
Can only make more then one self,. . . then the other one melt. . .
Getting spanked all around. . . All the crazies do us by belt. . .
What **** is the matter,. . . has time cut into your butter. . .
Greasing up all the streets,. . . boiling off all intelligence. .
Even speaker who shares with the world with poetic intelligence,. . .
thats love to the life. . . . with the time with his neighbors. . .
Such life is a streamer,. . . streaming through time, . . .
time of one's life surrounded by steam of another. . .
When we cram on one another, time is illusion. .
running over. . . creating a fusion. . .
one from another creating confusion. . .time is illusion. . .
To look at a counter, less fulfilment then want her. .
Because time as illusion. . . invades escape from this cooky confusion. . .
When eyes set bound to imposter, your dream in reality. . .
always forming when time is without a solution, . . .
just letting it go. . . unfurls deep worlds we've only just known. . .
beyond in time is the scape. . .where numbers be running. . .
a world out of shape. . . If time was a matter. . .
To please all our moods. . . this world would be great. . . but The world is so great. . .
all musicians we are, i promiss you know it. . .we flow around with each other. . .
But time has concealed her, to even distinct, the sound of the peaceful. .
Where sound is a stink. . .to even consider, where **** did we all go. . .
looking for clocks, on rocks and a mirror. . .
Time grieve, be a mirror. . For only as far as it goes, you'll never see her. . .
If time is illusion, our minds won't confuse her. . only to melt with the extra minute on clock. . .
To consider every moment,. . . . time is illusion. . .that every moment is just a matter of memory. .
In each other, and in some. . . Some parts are for bad, to refuse on the good,
and some parts are for good to refuse on the bad. . .
Positive time is our best, with time. . You forget its illusion when roaming galant and free. . .
Far from illusion hidden behind, there is a consorted of sorts. . . . misery. . Time is illusion

Rupert Murdock, the decrepit baboon skeleton,
airs his saggy old *****, just scraping the ****** post-riot pavement,
tethered by holy eternal varicose veins.
On the pulpit,
while his latest  18-year-old Sinclair media wife
is about to get another sponsorship from both
Chick-fil-A and Pornhub simultaneously.
She hoists up her 4 pounds of silicone and chastises the teleprompter.  
The non-stop, family-values-approved bride to bed conveyor belt of
plastic, airbrushed Barbie fantasies delivers again,
family prepped since  16 , timed to be next in line on her eighteenth birthday,
prenup in hand, already half-replaced before the vows finish, brain-dead sacrificial ******.
She delivers the one line of her lifetime :

“Pray for stricter FCC compliance!”

Rupert Murdoch, that brittle old heartless greedy leather hate balloon, waddling up to the baptismal like some ****-mummified televangelist.
His ******* looks like a pair of deflated Macy’s parade balloons, gray and dragging,
incalculable waddles
swinging under fluorescent stage lights,
while Fox News’ camera crews powder  them up
and then pretends not to stay  zoomed in.

Next to him, his Sinclair-branded trophy wife—18 years old,
teeth white enough to blind an orphan
leans in, hissing like a possessed Stepford wife:

“FCC compliance, Daddy, for our sponsors!”

Meanwhile the teleprompter glitches, spitting out a slurry of half-written QAnon hashtags and ****** ads. Every time the chyron updates, his granny-bedazzled MAGA ***** twitch
like a Sunday school metronome,
keeping that uneducated southern apprentice rerun rhythm
with Tucker Carlson’s embalmed pre-****** consta-sneer somehow still echoing
through the sound system.

The sexually repressed civil rights denier menopause crowd
goes wild,
waving hymnals made of Bible stock options
and AR-15 gun show manuals.
The choir belts “Fair & Balanced” like it’s the Nicene Creed.
Karen boomers in rhinestone MAGA hats throw ******* on stage till it rivals Mt. Rushmore.
Then another hate-filled racist streamer Infowars priest breaks in, live-commenting the *****’ tempo.

The traumatized, ritually molested and ignored choir kids are
all corporate mascots:
Ronald the death-of-cows McDonald,
the forgotten pizza-*******-addicted Noid,
the ******* Geico Gecko shame-and-fear puppet,
all singing the Fox News hymnal
while ****-chugging Bud Light in NFL jerseys.
The cross-shaped teleprompters melt into a deepfake of
Jesus hocking MyPillow and ***** pills
simultaneously.

The A.I. audience loses their scripted corpo-tested ****.
Hot G.O.P. elected ****-doll **** Karens fleece boomers in rhinestone MAGA hats,
steadily flinging Spanx and granny ******* toward the stage
like it’s a Pentecostal wet t-shirt contest.

Black priests react, screaming
“POGCHAMP BALL SWAY”
into their Amazon headset mics.

The choir is a corporate mascot freakshow.
The Fox camera pans to Grimace rising from the fryer grease
like Cthulhu saving the Hamburglar’s soul from the elitist liberals. Except now no one can tell Matt Gaetz from his exact twin Ronald McDonald
as they are both conducting with ketchup-stained Trump-approved Happy Meal scepters.
The Geico Gecko, in liturgical robes, chants in Cockney while doing snow angels on a pile of corporate lobbyist insurance regulation cash
(oh, and all tax free).
Judge Judy, in ecstasy, hammers a tambourine like a tweaked-out animated hemorrhoid
They belt out the Fox News hymnal, a distorted “Fair & Balanced”  sports score interrupted  drone.

Deepfake Jesus appears.
Holy hologram Christ, beaming and lifelike,
pitching mandatory prayer in school
AFTER  collection plate time.

“Blessed are the erectile, for they shall inherit the white Earth.”

" Rupert’s will is all-powerful. He hath made Trump into an infallible MAGA God, and soon the tiny-handed orange one of mushroom ***** glory shall be ascending like the Star of Bethlehem, guiding the gas-guzzling SUVs to Wal-Mart to stock up on bullets, for the numerous bunkers shall overflow with powdered supplements and the ****** of your neighbors.    ... Amen."

The crowd bows in Islamic unison.
Rupert, the angry ******* desiccated ******* scarecrow,
***** doing subliminal semaphore, adjusts ***** microphones, lipstick-covered ******* swaying like a doomsday pendulum,
as the choir’s chorus crescendos into a mashup of Fox jingles
Bringing in the sheep  and “Onward, Christian Soldiers.”

the heart butcher has found me once again tonight,
found that hidden passage so hollow now
into the torn void of my soul--
the net set still, my cave fell in & compromised once more.
you could not fail. i am defeated.
left questioning the marble days, bourbon drenched nights
heavy like the stone which sinks
in the wretched river of my veins,
the distant lost time thereafter.
thanatos comes to say hello & i shut my window instead.
tired of the game. no more nights
wasted trying to forget.
life is a ball of yarn
& i am unraveled
like a streamer.
tomorrow ends today

Across Hyrule he shall roam,
After Navi finds him and gives him his cue,
He shall visit Ranches, Castles, Villages, even a Tomb,
While wandering new garb he'll find - Wearin Green, Red, and even Blue.

This man - too old, too pure - rages at almost every turn,
Throwing controllers and yelling loud,
Cursing as he watches his stream crash and burn,
Not caring yet always aware if he's doing so in front of a crowd.

A streamer true,
A rager pure,
Old Man Skip is a runner for you,
Plays it once, plays it twice, but he'll play it for sure.

His highs and lows are far yet few,
Good days, bad days every day in-between,
He still greets everyone with smile weather old or new,
Stick around a while tell what you've seen.

Wave a hello, say a good-bye,
But always know:
Heroes are forever remembered - but Legends?
Legends Never Die

A child. An only child.
A child of the internet.
Raised on flashing images, raised on gorging down content.
Know the best and worst and most obscure video games right off the tip of your head.
Feel soothed by a streamer’s voice, get influenced by a community’s humor, find a niche, burrow in it.
Not many friends, but they raised you, made you feel not so alone, which you are, physically, mentally.
Stay up for hours, muted television, bright laptop screen.
They say blue light’s bad for the eyes, bad for circadian rhythms, let’s test out that theory.
There goes your role model, the one you want to meet desperately, dying over and over in some badly designed game.
No more anxiety, just the game.
No more life, just the stream.

The city is a morgue, as I look into the night
Each one is his own lord,
governed by a flashing light
No graceful compensation, where he broken hearts adorn
Utopia the nation, where all new souls must be born
a candle wick is burning, sending fire it's own way
You even may be learning, in the mire day by day
and who am I, the victim, who must stop death when it calls
Or banned by the restriction, of the shadow as it falls

The desert is a sea, made of sand like heat's own toy
no open arms are reaching, where the laughter comes to end
the hour's for beseeching;
Go wherever fate will send
An opera of the future, put itself onto the stage
the mind in need of nurture,
sometimes cries in mournful rage
And who am I, the dreamer, being backed against the walls
now the ray becomes a streamer,
and the shadow as it falls

The island is a loner, needing nothing but the breeze
and I am but a roamer, seeing promise in the trees
No heaven in the distance, at the top of the floating clouds
Thinking of the word "Resistance".
how I feel between the crowds
A windmill gently turning, on and on forever more
for paradise I'm yearning, and the time comes to explore
Hear the echo's bouncing vision,
in the deepness of the halls
I must make the last decision
with the shadow as it falls

A streamer hangs down lifelessly,
the party is over for you
and for me
the ice cream has gone
the candies have too
all that is left
is
me holding you
and the party is over
we
had lots of fun
we danced in the moonbeams
and ran through the sun

we tasted so much
touched even more
it's time to go home now
time for
closing the door.

Dave and the Knee

Dave twisted his knee one Saturday afternoon in the driveway. He and Sam had been fooling around with a basketball, one of those impromptu father-son contests where neither of them actually knew the rules but both were convinced they were winning.

Sam, taller and younger, had the advantage. But Dave had experience—or at least, what he thought was experience. He made a sudden pivot, a dramatic move meant to show Sam who really knew the game, and something inside his knee gave a loud, wet pop.

He froze in place, his hands on his hips, trying to play it cool. “Just a little tweak,” he said, though the color had drained from his face. Sam tilted his head and said, “Dad, you look like you just got shot.”

Morley came outside just in time to see Dave hobbling toward the porch like a man escaping a pirate duel. “What happened this time?” she asked, though she already knew the answer. With Dave, there was always a “this time.”

The doctor told him it wasn’t serious—yet. A mild ligament strain. But he warned Dave that the next one could mean bigger trouble: surgery, long recovery, months of physiotherapy.

Dave nodded solemnly, the way you do when someone gives you very serious advice. But in his mind, he had already decided that this was going to be handled the old-fashioned way: with grit, denial, and perhaps an ice pack if Morley forced it on him.

Physiotherapy, as far as Dave was concerned, was not medicine. It was medieval. He was convinced every physiotherapist had trained by studying the works of Torquemada and the Spanish Inquisition.

“They don’t heal you,” he told Kenny Wong over coffee. “They break you. Then they tell you it’s good for you.” Kenny, who had once been told to stretch before jogging and promptly tore his hamstring, nodded in sympathy.



This was not, in Dave’s mind, his first basketball injury. No, no. His “career” had been marked by drama from the very beginning.

Back in high school, Dave had played for the North Bay District Wildcats. Or rather, he had been listed on the team. His main role was to be called in when everyone else had fouled out, sprained something, or wandered off to the cafeteria.

But Dave loved basketball. He loved the sound of the ball thumping on the hardwood, the squeak of sneakers, the roar of the crowd. The crowd, of course, rarely roared for him.

There was one game against Timmins that he remembered with both horror and pride. Dave, filled with sudden inspiration, decided he was going to dunk the ball.

He was five-foot-eight on a good day, with shoes and hair. Dunking was not in his repertoire. But Dave was not the kind of man to let reality interfere with ambition.

He charged the net, leapt as high as his legs would carry him, and slammed the ball with all his might.

The ball hit the rim like a cannonball, ricocheted back, and smacked Dave directly in the forehead.

He collapsed, unconscious. When he came to, the crowd was cheering. For Timmins.

Later, he would say this was the moment he realized his real talent wasn’t in sports but in “building character.” And so, when his knee gave out in the driveway decades later, he told himself, “This is just another character-building injury.”

The doctor had given him stretches. He had given him resistance-band exercises. He had even demonstrated them. “Do these at home,” he said.

Dave promised he would. And then, of course, he didn’t.

Morley would find the resistance band on the kitchen counter, coiled like an unused party streamer. She’d leave sticky notes: Ten reps, twice a day.

Dave would read the note, sigh heavily, and pour himself a coffee instead. “Tomorrow,” he’d mutter. Tomorrow never came.

When Morley asked, “Did you do your physio?” Dave would look wounded, as though she had accused him of a terrible crime. “I’m pacing myself,” he’d say. “These things take time.”

“You’re supposed to pace your exercises,” Morley would reply, “not your excuses.”


This wasn’t Dave’s first run-in with modern exercise either. A few years back, Morley had convinced him to join the YMCA. “Just to keep in shape,” she’d said.

On his first day, Dave wandered around the weight room like a man lost in a foreign country. The machines all looked like they’d been designed by NASA for zero-gravity torture experiments.

He finally chose the elliptical trainer. “Looks safe,” he muttered.

For thirty glorious seconds, Dave felt invincible. His legs pumped, his arms swung, he was practically an Olympian.

Then he realized he couldn’t stop. His legs churned faster and faster, like a hamster on a wheel.

Sweat poured down his face. His shirt clung to him. He reached for the stop button, but the machine yanked his arm back each time like a cruel trick.

People gathered to watch. A kindly old lady called, “You’re doing great, dear!”

Finally, Dave launched himself sideways off the machine, landed in a heap on the yoga mats, and lay there gasping like a shipwreck survivor.

That was the end of his YMCA career. From then on, he insisted exercise should come “naturally.” Like walking to the fridge.


So it made perfect sense to everyone who knew him that Dave would resist physiotherapy.

The problem was, everyone else was invested in his recovery. Morley kept track of his exercises. Sam teased him. The neighbors, catching wind of his injury, suggested yoga classes.

Even the physiotherapist herself, a cheerful woman named Stephanie, had developed a certain look. It was the look teachers give when they know you haven’t done your homework.

“You’re not doing your exercises, are you, Dave?” she said one afternoon.

“Of course I am!” Dave replied. “I do them all the time. At home. In private. I don’t like to brag about it.”

Stephanie raised an eyebrow. “Funny,” she said. “Your knee doesn’t agree.”



Soon it wasn’t just Morley and Stephanie keeping him accountable. Sam began making jokes about medieval torture.

“Careful, Dad,” he’d say, “Stephanie might bring out the iron maiden next week.”

Dave would grumble. “She already has. It’s called a stationary bike.”

Even the neighbors got involved. When Dave shuffled past Mrs. Patterson’s house, she called, “Don’t forget to do your stretches, dear!”

Kenny Wong suggested they do the exercises together, as a kind of support group. The idea of Kenny wobbling on one leg with a resistance band nearly convinced Dave to try. Nearly.

But when it came down to it, Dave always found a reason to avoid the work. There was always a book to read, a coffee to drink, a record to play.



And then, one day, while reaching for a jar of pickles on the top shelf, Dave’s knee buckled again.

He let out a strangled cry, part pain, part surprise, and part something else: the sudden realization that maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t invincible anymore.

Morley rushed in, exasperated. “This is exactly what the doctor warned you about!” she said.

Dave sat on the floor, clutching the pickle jar. “I was just trying to make a sandwich,” he muttered.

“Dave,” Morley said gently, “you have to do the exercises.”

And finally, sitting there with his pride and his pickles, Dave admitted—maybe she was right.

FAIRY TALES CAN COME TRUE...

My little daughter
wants to be Cinderella

& go to the ball
with Mummy & Daddy

& so we banish the babysitter
(so wickedly pretty)

(who still gets paid just to be banished)

We dress our darling daughter
as if she were a fairy story come true

a spangled tutu...wand... and ballet shoes.

I sweep up my little pumpkin
and carry her like a male fairy godmother

to the ball of balloons and cocktail laughter
and dance with my little streamer-strewn princess.

But even a princess can tire of excess
and she ends up asleep

under my top hat... opera scarf... and coat.

Later I carry my sweetness through street after street
careful not to wake or spill her dreams

... remembering to steal her left hand shoe
...waking her just as midnight bongs

so that she knew...

But now she sleeps
(and sleeps believing)
that fairy tales can come true and that

...they can happen to you

with a Daddy who tweaks reality

... just that little bit

...just for you.

FAIRY TALES CAN COME TRUE...

My little daughter
wants to be Cinderella

& go to the ball
with Mummy & Daddy

& so we banish the babysitter
(so wickedly pretty)

(who still gets paid just to be banished)

We dress our darling daughter
as if she were a fairy story come true

a spangled tutu...wand... and ballet shoes.

I sweep up my little pumpkin
and carry her like a male fairy godmother

to the ball of balloons and cocktail laughter
and dance with my little streamer-strewn princess.

But even a princess can tire of excess
and she ends up asleep

under my top hat... opera scarf... and coat.

Later I carry my sweetness through street after street
careful not to wake or spill her dreams

... remembering to steal her left hand shoe
...waking her just as midnight bongs

so that she knew...

But now she sleeps
(and sleeps believing)
that fairy tales can come true and that

...they can happen to you

with a Daddy who tweaks reality

... just that little bit

...just for you.

Having fun having fun
Having so much fun
Not breaking any laws
Opening many doors
Yes I am having fun
You see I wanna be a video streamer
I prefer it to a cleaner
It has a life I want to have
I have got a new bed
For Margaret John and Greg
But they don’t want it
So I will use it rest my young fresh leg
Party up in the solar system yeah
I used to be a rebel
Nearly getting kicked out of my house
For bad language
And I know how it feels to be not wanted
But now I have my teddies
On my cupboard and in my bedding
Yes I am cool oh yeseree
I watch shameless cause it is about
A poor family with an alcoholic dad
You see I occasionally was like him
Bit o was trying to be young
And I had a lot of fun
With my party on dude kinda ways