Dedicated to the One I Love

A rotten little dog with muttonchops
Harassed me on my way downtown one day

A dozen yards from where the streetcar stops

To slobber on my hand to say, "Let's play."

I moved away and yet the dog again

Approached; I looked around to see who ran

This cur of many colours all in vain

For naught I saw except a garbage can.

This slobberer continued slobbring while

I wondered what to do to get away;

I saw the streetcar coming from a mile

And wondered if the dog would haply stay.

The dog still licking handly followed me

Up to the door and made as if to ride;

That's when the driver very thankfully

Laid down the law, to wit: "No dogs inside."

Inside the car I went directly rear

To see the dog stock-still with staring eyes

Outside meet with a doggy look sincere

My not-so-sudden keen and watry eyes.

I wonder if you felt like that that day

You let me read your ticket near the bus

That started quick to carry you away;

I didn't know it meant the end of us.

That rotten dog eermore I'll never see;

But now I have an insight into thee.

 

*

 

It's so Antarctica outside I woke

Today in neon's artificial light

And shut my eyes again so's not to see

The research station's walls of whitewash white,

 

To see in silence south as south can be

If I could still recall your almond eyes

But all I saw this morn was something brown--

Crayola brown--and wasn't I surprised.

 

I didn't know it never snows down here,

Or how it is a desert in disguise.

I didn't know I'd miss you so away,

Or how a heart with fear can oxidize.

 

We've all run out of jokes to tell, we've watched

That series "Breaking Bad" five times,

It's boring here in Summer in the dark,

So self-amusingly I write these rhymes

 

To you, although three months will fully pass

Before you'll even know what I have done,

So far away you are you could well be

At antipode, beneath the midnight sun....

 

The only thing surprising is the moon

Which in one day will slide into our ken,

Straight horizontally, and stay there will,

Two weeks before it dips away again;

 

As like our tilt will make it Fall and then

I'll leave this frozen hellish research place,

Cross Capricorn and Cancer meaning to

Renew remembrance of your lovely face.

 

*

 

There's an empty storage locker there

With nothing in it

Something resonates with me here

I'm not quite here

 

I sleep when I'm tired and wake

When I'm not

All over I'm all thinking about you

And everything that you've got

 

I envy the bamboo stalks

That quiver as you pass

If only I could be as honest

As they clearly want to be

 

As usual, things got worse overnight

Sleeping minute by minute

Thank God for your everlasting beauty

Some things stay the same

 

I have been unfair to you in so many ways

I accuse you of the same

So you're off somewhere with someone

And it's only June

 

It's like I had a great joke about Mississauga

Prepared for stand-up night

And I needed to find someone from Mississauga

In the audience

 

I am not a constellation

Nor am I a star

But like them I look in your direction

To see how sweet you are

 

Where will you be in 100 years?

Will I too be there?

Where will I be in 100 years?

Will you even care?

 

Look at that dog sleeping

So quiet

One paw darker than the other

I know what worries him

 

*

 

The strong hydraulic current pushing here

Defeats my panicked urge to steer

Myself to weedy harbours marginal

And grab set matter, as a barnacle

Desiring sweets in plankton on a hull

Will flex its filaments to grip a scull;

The ice above, so slick and winter-wet,

A frosted glass revealing sky's dry net,

Prevents my lungs from getting what they want,

So disconnected from my heart's wild wont

They think they should be masters of this space,

As mutinous mouths believe they run the face;

And as I swim the freezing water's way

I pass by fishes that all seem to stay

Suspended both in spot and in surprise

Perhaps intuiting it's contra-wise

For warm-bloods to be swimming in a stream

In February far from August's steam;

And as I swim down-water now I strip

Away my soggy shoes and socks, unzip

My jeans and peel away my coat and T

And so and so I horizontally

Continue falling downward slowly sloped

Toward my destined, wanted, and my hoped;

And then I'm finally there so suddenly

I'm not concerned at all how soddenly

I look today to her, my open bay:

I heave myself 'cross ice to our chalet.

She sees me coming in dishevelled state,

And wants to know just why I am so late.

 

*

 

If I was struck by lightning and went back....

Like Witold Gombrowicz's Ferdydurke

if he'd controlled where he was sent to be, I

know where I would choose to be again,

enough to set it down with ballpoint pen.

 

My choice would be fifth grade, again,

a time I started noticing the girls,

receiving right their ripe maturities,

yet never letting on my proper age.

 

My strategy could be to write them verse,

a lot of verse since now I know that girls

cannot resist acrostics or a rhyme;

Deciding thus, and doing thus, I'd thus

obliterate their tender little hearts,

negating all resistance to my charm,

evading the defensive strategies,

like Romeo with fifteen Juliets,

like Dylan with his dozen sad-eyed girls

!

 

*

 

if I awake today and stretch my arms out wide and think about the dream I'd had of anything at all suppose I'd dreamt of dogs or cats or something from the distant past or even ones I haven't seen for many years or maybe I look up and to the right to where the window is and think about the seasons and their different slants of light or wonder what one sees when looking into space when nothing's there for billions millions miles or even simply think about the shaping of my knees beneath the spread my mother's given me

then that's some time I've meaninglessly wasted on mundanities unchangeable

then that's a bunch of seconds thrown away wherein I could have purposely pursued

then that's the time I feel a guilt like grief at letting me myself distract

then there I lie in tears believing all is lost and cannot be regained

then death I feel in premonition ice my feet and hands

then blackness close my eyes then black

then blackness close my eyes

then blackness close

then black

because that's time that's gone for all wherein I could have had your image occupy my heart and soul

 

*

 

(or pagan ways).

for heaven's kiss

above the clouds

in love again

my love for you

to find again

the breathless air

up through the air

and then I climb

(approximate)

ten thousand feet

and up I go

at all all cold

to find it's not

to which I go

with ladder light

as if new-made

aluminum

a taper of

the mountain peak

and there upon

the mountain peak

and then I spy

at summit's peak

they won't be used

because I know

and socks then all

I lose the shirt

this altitude

and though it's cold

at mile five

discarding pack

for me to climb

eleven more

for seemingly

but only dirt

where there's no stairs

continue up

but I with pack

who wheres below

and so they go

(or mostly so)

the syntax apt

because they lack

who make this trip

because there's few

abruptly end

and then the steps

of left and right

eleven miles

step switchback some

along a steep

ascent that goes

before the next

where can't I pause

then through a door

for ninety more

becoming wood

eventually

of metal steps

up ninety flights

I start to climb

my steely back

My pack upon

 

*

 

About a thousand years it feels ago
I crossed the state of Tennessee by bus
To see the Memphis' Mississippi flow

And Arkansas the other side across

Alone, from Nashville for a day I'd come

From visiting my brother where I'd been

At backstage Ryman Auditorium

And Vanderbilt uptown I'd also seen

But anyway to Memphis sole I went

To be a tourist on my own first time

In all my life and all my own I spent

A night without a reason or a rhyme.

So first I went to Beale Street where indeed

I had a sandwich plus a glass of swill:

My munching dinner was accompanied

By some guy playing 'Margaritaville'

Chording quite enthusiastickly

Upon a honky-tonk, and there I sat

As goddamn lonely ever one could be‑

I couldn't take to strangers‑that was that.

So anyway to make a long pome brief

That night I spent alone in my hotel

With crosswords plus the sad-but-true relief

Of costly cable soft-core porn as well;

In hidden agony I telephoned

Toronto, she I'd met so recently

I called, to say I felt so all alone

And missed her all to death entirely.

My solitude erupted primal fear:

I'd never known how much I needed her.

 

*

 

There ought to be a law about these broads,

These married broads who think their wedding

Licences are licences to hunt down rods

With glances, honey words, and legs a-spreading,

Who say, to make their paramours succumb,

That no-one ever missed a slice of bread

That from a loaf already cut had come,

And honey such trite breadcrumbs to the bed

Wherein the prick is springingly abused,

And cries not heard in prime time sound the house,

And prophylactics lay about unused,

And bathing quickly 'fore returns her spouse,

A loyal caitiff dressed in bread of white

Too busy perving on the neighbour's daughter

To notice there's no water hot at night

Or how a trinket 'found' to one he bought her

She prefers; o save us from the married ones!

Experienced and self-affirming so,

With breasts maturely ripe, with pre-kned buns,

All hot and moist and always squirming so!

In offices, department stores: the bus

Is fully stocked each morn! with eyes and lips

That know their charms superfluous,

Because they know the youngsters they eclipse!

Protect yourself today, my testē friends!

Don't throw away your virtues on some moms!

For once you start the ride, it never ends!

Look ye for ringless fingers, noble toms!

 

*

 

I knew a drummer by name MacAuley, such a happy lad

He'd play alongside Jonesy in his particoloured plaid

But the stories that we heard on him would make a Sister mad

For when he left the drumming-ground he'd treat his drum so bad

 

Then he went, then he went, then he went

Down, down, down, down, down, down, down

Then he went down

And he went down

 

MacAuley, see, he had this thing for things 'twere in his house

No woman there for fornication's pleasures as a spouse

Instead he made his use of stuff to keep his member roused

From dusk to dawn, by God he would, 'twould shock a churchless mouse

 

Then he went etc.

 

He'd keep it up with banisters and dowels and with stairs

He'd work his biz on oranges on peaches and on pears

He'd take advantage of his furs until they had no hairs

And if you were plumbing man you'd better best bewares

 

Then he went etc.

 

Till one fine day he didn't show for practice on the green

We all went round to his place there to see what could be seen

The fool had gone too far it seemed he'd drunk down gasoline

The parlour was a shambles all and slick with Vaseline

 

Then he went etc.

 

*

 

I find the morning with regret like a safety curtain's fall,

Denying me the anaesthesia of happiness that dreaming makes,

Changing me minorly from pure plenitude to the limited life,

Making the colour of blue recognizably blue again and so on,

Where fabric can't but be felt as fabric rather than copper,

And reason doesn't seem to mind absurdity but rather boosts,

To find myself in a room with only my cobwebs under the bed,

And for a moment or two I was blissfully unaware of matters,

Matters that I think badly of myself when I don't feel them,

When I in moments selfishly am thinking of anything but you,

When I find I've not thought of you for seven minutes or so,

When I find the morning and for minutes I am somewhere else,

Not circling your hot sphere like some googly-eyed asteroid,

When I am ashamed to think about things as simple as supper,

I try to pretend that my mindlessness means nothing fretful,

That it is not representative of something deeply malignant,

And rather pretend it's a slip of the mind unrepresentative,

That it's not an augur of death and decay and forgetfulness,

That it is not a harbinger of the day we'll inevitably part.

 

*

 

The show cannot go on

The journeys at an end

So roll up the door and tear down the floor

Theres no more notes to send

 

Weve done what needs be done

Weve lived a lengthy spell

The place is a mess and its nobodys guess

How furnished have we hell

 

Lets pack away the puppies

And throw away the cat

The life we have led when alls done and said

Time to cut out the fat

 

What could be more absurd

To stick it out some more

Weve run out of space and you cant stand my face

We no longer know what for

 

The days are getting short

The clock is ticking fast

Were both getting old with hearts growing mold

Forever nothing lasts

 

So let the house burn down

The ashes we will love

Lets simply deprave for theres nothing to save

No middle below or above

 

The show cannot go on

With all these masquerades

With nothing to give theres little to live

I think were living Hades

 

Heres sea salt for my grave

Forgive me for my tone

Bury me prairie me and I will be merry me

For I should die alone

 

*

 

How did it fall apart so hastily?

I thought we were in love so prettily!

I'd give a dozen useful teeth to know,

Or maybe two. Or maybe one point five.

Gee maybe there was something that I missed....

 

A year ago I bought a hundred books

At bargain prices, buck a pop exact;

Today I got around to opening one

And found that it was most entirely blank!

I checked the other ninety-nine and sure

Enough they all were void of words and sen

Tences! "There's not a comma, not a stop,

And not a semicolon in the lot!" I cried.

Disgusted I, I packed them up into

A furnace box that measured six by four

By four and slapped a label on the side

And wrote "RETURN TO SENDER!" in all caps.

I took it to the postal outlet in

The mall insisting that I nothing pay

To have it sent! The postie shrugged and dragged

It to the back. "We finished here?" I cried

On his return. He shrugged and off I went.

'Twas only when outside I realized

The books weren't blank at all, not blank at all,

But rather I'd refused to see the words

And ink and punctuation too sublime!

 

*

 

The dawn comes. I awake. I'm still adream.

I'm fitzing in a warehouse stupidly.

The boxes are some redolent; they seem

To bring a dear dead friend to life.

The dead: Gary Wagner. Robert Gutsell.

Douglas Chenhall. David Phlug.

I loved them all, and they're all dead now.

(Don't women die? I guess I'll never know.)

The dawn comes. If only you could see

Me how I want you now, wanting you so much

The dead don't matter cuz the dead

Can bury the dead so on so forth.

But you are life my love not phantasy,

And wake I regimented to your ide,

And thankfully I've not some wasted time

In thinking of the dream more than I should.

There's nothing but dull space that separates

Ourselves from one another; still you're far

Enough away that all I want is sweeting dreams

Or phantasies of you with distanced me.

Need I go on? Need I enumerate?

I doubt you'll ever read this don't you doubt?

My name for you's invented by my mind;

I doubt you even know I'm anywhere;

Your picture's only in my fertile head;

It's best you don't so practically exist;

It's best invented and encoded thus.

 

*

 

Is time for real?

The Globe and Mail

No longer prints

Your favourite strip,

And hasn't for

A dozen years.

 

I miss your eyes!

The world has rolled

Around the sun

A dozen times

And still I'm stuck

At heaven's gate.

 

You haven't missed

The cinema

Because there's no

Good films no more

Scorsese's still

Around ... but still....

 

I thought of you

This evening when

I walked between

A sidewalk scene:

A teenage girl

With frightened eyes

 

In t-shirt, jeans

Beside a car

Some crisis there

Another woman,

Driver there,

Was taking her

 

Some other place.

The driver called,

'Please call Philippe

'And tell him what--'

Another voice

Responded with

 

'Don't worry dear,

'It's all in hand.'

And as I made

Some distance I

Distinctly heard

A sobbing girl.

 

I wonder why

I thought of you.

(Perhaps because

(I've thought of you

(All day....) I thought

Of you because

 

(I'm guessing here)

I thought you scared

Of something old

And musty in

Your mental clothes,

Some nastiness

 

I never tried

To ever see.

For I've got wounds

Myself, because

The thorns of life

Et set et set.

 

I thought I'd say

Your name to end,

But, no, that's not

The way to end

A love's lament:

In eulogy.