Writings, Reviews, Cultural Criticism
Tongue the jagged edge.Take a sliver from unbuffed wood,a splinter in the eye. Blister the ragged thumbthrough a frayed asbestos oven mitt,a searing Pyrex dish. Barter with the man,a local artisan of handicraftsand rustic klatsch. Pause at the eulogy,the rough-hewn words of a nervousnephew’s ramblings. Hoe a chip-edged furrowthat follows a taut stringed template,a back…
We first meet in the smoking lounge. Ward 3C. Psychiatric. The only place in the hospital where you’ll find a smoking lounge.
Why has this calm stolen over mewhen I lost countless years, not to rage alone, nor to joy, but to both,jittering between the two like the lines on an EEG,the REM patterns of a cold-sweat nightmare”s sleep? Why have I found a stillness in this hourwhen waters crash on eastern shores bearing bodies out to…
Almost as if to illustrate my two previous posts that propose a new poetics of authenticity, the latest issue of Oprah Winfrey’s magazine came careening through my window. To bring you up to speed, I have previously described “authenticity” as the 21st century’s favourite yardstick for measuring the worth of a poem. The notion of “authenticity”…
I’ve noticed that as people age, they have more fun reminiscing with their peers than with their children and grandchildren. When my parents get together with their friends and start talking about people they knew in school or things that happened before I was born, it’s feels like I’m standing outside in the cold and staring through the window at the warmth inside.
I wrote this poem just the other day in anticipation of all the captains that will be zooming into town this weekend. Can any of them inspire the kind of adulation Walt Whitman felt for his captain? I’m inclined to think today’s captains do what they do without accountability, not because they are deliberately deceptive, but because they operate under the cover a world filled with distraction.
I journeyed to the temple,a pilgrim borne on the wingsof a promise that I live better.I did, I did, oh I did.Face pressed almost to the floor,I rooted out every last coin,snuffling into the corner, kneesworn, but blessed with my reward:a two-for-one on tube socksheaped like fishes in a discount binfor the credulous multitudes. John…
My thing is not your thing;your thing is not my thing.Particulate things enclosed in force fields,bouncing off each other and brick walls,marbles flung from a sling shot. Talking through string between tincans, graduating to Morsecode on flashes of light betweenbedroom windows, semaphores,made-up codes, rudimentaryencryption. Now everyone’s talk is coded.The keys have gone missing: an aphasic blare,…
Insight for needlesVoodoo dolls for charactersNovels for revenge I offer this haiku, remembering how, as a teenager, I fought with a friend who refused to see things my way. My view was obviously right, and his refusal was just him being mulish. Since I couldn’t budge him, I opted for the next best thing: I…
The stack, a vertical grey against the blue,flinging strands—smoke?—but they’re white.Let’s be generous and say its steam.Birds wheel in play or in anger:What I saw; what I saw. The chair creaks, the wood beneath it groans;on the back, a cashmere sweater,draped where it was hung, eggshell,a button missing, swaying with the chair:What I saw; what…
This is a poem about copyright law and my fear (the chilling effect) of quoting other authors (eg. Pigeon & Page). There is something perverse about living in what some describe as the postmodern era, where quotation and mashup are cultural norms, while our laws increasingly operate to suppress these norms.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. — Arthur C. Clarke I don’t know how things work.Take lava lamps for example:the rise and fall of globuleslike red corpuscles squeezedin a mysterious rhythm.I’m amazed the lava doesn’t meltthrough the glass. The blobsare real lava, aren’t they? Take the financial markets:the rise and fall of shares,the lifeblood…
A children’s verse takes on a sinister tone when it’s tied to the irresponsible conduct of BP, the world’s 4th largest TNC, an organization which continues to feed us lies even as it becomes apparent that BP has perpetrated one of the worst environmental disasters in history.
The reed leans into the windas if listening for a secret,an image which stirs the eye withinthe eye within, and no less real for the fact that it happened hereat a pine table in a suburbankitchen with not a reed for miles,but a pen poised over a scratch pad leaning, steep, like a reed into…
A warm and blustery wind from the southhas caught me full on my mouthand turned to red and black and bluea cheek that once shone white for you. I wanted a single room apart,but you demanded all my heart.What you asked I gave for free,withholding nothing, me to thee. On flat stomach and virgin monsran…