mt. st. vincent.

this is how I feel about academia: along the way you lose a few.

so what?

like a face.

What I wish for you
is nothing but fraud and petulance, camphor in
your proceedings, a brick in your mailbox, a wicked
bitter woman stealing your truck.

-- Erica Bernheim

the long way.

I cannot love you all and I won't.

The shoulder knows the will of the heart and its way around
a crowd. The clam-soft give. The crack of the shell.

Help me recognize your humanity -- talk in a low slow voice,
wave your lunch bone arms.

The children with keys at collarbone are building fires
in the tunnels, forts at every junction.

Let them go. The way is littered with leftovers --
pale white stalks, tender volva. Pick one. Another.

There are other ways home.

Brushed metal canines, the gate, will score
what you can afford to leave behind.

Impress me with your stones, your height.
The sweet dip of your neck.

All that you love,
keep high.

-- Union Station, Dani Couture.

corneal damage.

you are the eye that sees itself
in the cold light of early morning.
you have no shame, remorse,
but no love either.
be cautious in your daily proceedings,
as you may discover
you had forgotten the difference
between a thief and a politician,
a friend and a salesperson.
may you never be graced
with the curse of nostalgia, regret or reflection.

one day you might wake up to discover
you had been tying your shoes
with a dead man's hand;
you will stumble out of cabs and buses
and mistake a bright and low-hanging moon
for a streetlamp.

I had the blues, but I shook them loose.

sooner or later a bright day comes
and it digs into the cellar of the darkest hearts
that it is more rare than it is true.

burial.

I have joined the ranks
of fugitives, flightless birds, abandoned relations,
and orphaned diaspora.
at last, I have been thrown into adulthood
to live this grief by pretending that it doesn't exist,
by repeting
that most of us live like this.
no scholar can calculate
the distance between us
or the precise amount of time
it takes to cross it.
my life without you is a contorted animal carcass
on the road to nowhere.
you have set me free
like a hound into the empty field
with no aim.
I want to be a funeral director
so I can relive this death again and again.
I want know if it ever ends.

protection spells.

bleak, expansive, dust-blown lyricism with a heavy emphasis on haunted introspection: I would like this to be my jacket cover summary or tombstone.

why are we stopping on this road?

there has never been a good night for letting you friends down
there has never been a good night for being cheap
there has never been a good night for ripping people off
but there ain’t no law against it
obviously you don’t see no law against it
obviously you haven’t seen nothing wrong with it.

your love is like

the bright and distant refinery flame:
intense, never-ceasing, and a stark reminder
of things sacrificed along the way.
a wavering mirage in the hot dry Alberta air;
a mixed blessing.
too dangerous to get up close
for fear of explosion,
yet a comforting silhouette
for those seeking the way home.
a beacon, a singpost, a warning.
I don't know what to do with this kind of love.

where I want to be.

the space between your exhales,

1/3 of the city lives alone.

the dull glow of Costco lights remind me of my life without you.
these aisles filled with people whose eyes are emptily
searching for another fill,
these evenings spent
picking various fast-food outlets, like jewels.
drive for the sake of driving,
keeping death at bay,
like some sort of Jorge Semprun novel.
I am not lonely, but I am lone
some.
I am not proud of myself, but this is how I get through winter.

this poem

is for all those Albertans wishing they lived in BC:
take me with you.