Proof
up north alone I slip into the lake —
later I will strip, drape my trunks over the deck
and the sun will dry them in four minutes:
the lake and I know
in Olympian gold light I go to town,
park in the teacher’s lot at the vacant county high
warm up for some time on a cinderless oval
run a mile in four minutes
drive back to the lake tasting blood leaving
a track of shoeprints in dust a mile long
to disappear in two gusts of a breeze:
my legs and I know
up north alone: a dream leaving make believe trip—
leaving the yardstick city as dream’s leaves—
I am a tree that falls in the woods:
ask the lake
Elements of Daydreams
the buds, the keys, the leaves
those leaves, the colours, bare trees
Can’t be wistful about money.
Wistful’s got, you know, wist.
Plenty other things to go wistful on.
Take that G_____ works the desk—
makes you wistful. Faraway
train in the night make you.
Sun hits your neck when you have some
free time turn you wistful.
Shadow of a low plane arcing through
Eglinton Park. Trysts that you keep
on a map in your brain, places you save
in your savoury memory. Mansions
you fashion from stars from the sky
you can reach them from bed through September
night air. Open windows, all the rooms
in the world, I guess space can make you wistful.
Botany in time in season after season
in scrutiny fields of dandelion fluff—
it’s a fact: sniffing can also make
you wistful.
The tender of wistful
is daydreams.
Of dreams in the night
the tender is metaphor.
All this is precious little to do with money.
Wistful is space and free time: on occasion
misspelt “wasteful.” Some folks just plain
don’t get it. Some do. Some
take the time to pause,
to stop resisting wistful.
Patience
“Show me your heart—
let me rip your ribs apart.
Show me it, show it!
Let not pride be the blood’s conduit.
In the night, on your side, when you sigh
should I not wonder why?
Perhaps I will show first—”
then she unzipped her purse
and out flew a small bird, delicate, green
it hovered above us—terrified, seen
then returned to its nest.
“Now I’ll show you the rest.”
I quivered and winced in my place.
“It’s lovely,” I said, saving face.
“I slander your beauty with meanness,
and somehow there’s more — we progress—”
lay my hand on her breast, closed the light, went to bed.
“Perhaps you will show me tomorrow,” she said.
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