Linked below is a letter-to-the-editor I wrote to the Burnaby Now during the Teacher's Strike two weeks ago. I guess they liked it, 'cos here it is! I apologize in advance for the typos - they were the fault of the formatting changes, not me, I swear (seriously, at one point they change the word "forgotten" to "forgot-ten"). Also half of the paragraph breaks were added by the site so that it didn't look like a solid block of text. Keeping that in mind, go check it out if you have a moment!
http://www.burnabynow.com/opinion/Student+speaks+teachers/6312339/story.html
Tuesday, 20 March 2012
Tuesday, 31 January 2012
Why I Take the Train - a List poem
This poem was based on a list I've been compiling of people and sights (mostly people) that I see/have seen on my weekly commutes from my home in Burnaby to downtown Vancouver. It only takes 20-25 minutes, but I'll be damned if that little time isn't full to the gills with interesting things to see.
From dusk into darkness
I am a bundle of coat, scarf and glove
Curled calmly by a heater and shot
Through a haze of polluted trees
And roofs of tin and red tile
Snow-capped mountains tinged pink
A murder of crows on their way to roost
Pockmarking a sky marbled with clouds
By me sit o'er-ladened mothers offering
Candy to pig-tailed children
Withered men whose gazes go nowhere
As they make their way home
Boys full of pride and life
Laughing loudly into touchscreen mouth-pieces
And tired women with too much weight
In their bruised eyes
Wrapped in my bundle I take to the streets
Through crowds and smoke to a second heater
I pass unguarded piles of rags and
Cardboard signs next to coin-filled coffee cups
Cracked lips pursed around cigarettes
Held in leathery hands
Buskers with sax, trumpet, fiddle, guitar
Microphone and rugged voice
Crammed in a sea of felt jackets and
iPod wires and sweaty armpits I
Reach my destination
Upon my return, I am greeted by greenish lights
And the hollow racket of a train on its track
There sits a man with a
Bloated, burnt and purpling jaw
Crooked teeth poking over a bottom lip
That hangs out thick and fleshy
By him dances a boy whose eyes are
Obscured by thick sunglasses
And whose body bends to a ghostly beat
Provoking me into a quiet smile
From dusk into darkness
I am calm and unafraid
I am confident and comfortable
For I know I'm among friends.
From dusk into darkness
I am a bundle of coat, scarf and glove
Curled calmly by a heater and shot
Through a haze of polluted trees
And roofs of tin and red tile
Snow-capped mountains tinged pink
A murder of crows on their way to roost
Pockmarking a sky marbled with clouds
By me sit o'er-ladened mothers offering
Candy to pig-tailed children
Withered men whose gazes go nowhere
As they make their way home
Boys full of pride and life
Laughing loudly into touchscreen mouth-pieces
And tired women with too much weight
In their bruised eyes
Wrapped in my bundle I take to the streets
Through crowds and smoke to a second heater
I pass unguarded piles of rags and
Cardboard signs next to coin-filled coffee cups
Cracked lips pursed around cigarettes
Held in leathery hands
Buskers with sax, trumpet, fiddle, guitar
Microphone and rugged voice
Crammed in a sea of felt jackets and
iPod wires and sweaty armpits I
Reach my destination
Upon my return, I am greeted by greenish lights
And the hollow racket of a train on its track
There sits a man with a
Bloated, burnt and purpling jaw
Crooked teeth poking over a bottom lip
That hangs out thick and fleshy
By him dances a boy whose eyes are
Obscured by thick sunglasses
And whose body bends to a ghostly beat
Provoking me into a quiet smile
From dusk into darkness
I am calm and unafraid
I am confident and comfortable
For I know I'm among friends.
The Consequence of Salt - an experiment with imagery
I've always loved and been fascinated with the sea, so expect a lot of pieces like this in the future :)
This started as a purely sensuous poem, but quickly turned into a weird, vague-ish metaphor. Probably will be subject to more revision, but for now I like it the way it is.
Fingers creep over her skin,
whose mineral frost patterns it with diamonds.
She is pulled tight and calloused as leather,
wind-whipped
and burned.
Her nose is a study in raw,
black hair bleached a honeyed brown
her eyes lightened too with the
warm and fading sun.
Across the peeling spines of fallen trees
she walks with hardened soles;
o'er crackling weeds
rattling stones and
broken glass
she makes a path to the sea.
This started as a purely sensuous poem, but quickly turned into a weird, vague-ish metaphor. Probably will be subject to more revision, but for now I like it the way it is.
Fingers creep over her skin,
whose mineral frost patterns it with diamonds.
She is pulled tight and calloused as leather,
wind-whipped
and burned.
Her nose is a study in raw,
black hair bleached a honeyed brown
her eyes lightened too with the
warm and fading sun.
Across the peeling spines of fallen trees
she walks with hardened soles;
o'er crackling weeds
rattling stones and
broken glass
she makes a path to the sea.
The Ash Tree - an experiment with sound
Note: by sound, I mean the sound of repetition. Also, some thematic sounds when it comes to the lines about lips and teeth. Started out as a straight love poem about finding love in the ashes of the metaphorical fire of passionate lust (I always wanted to stomp on the "love as fire" metaphor), but deteriorated into angry madness faster than I'd expected.
When that blaze of passion passes
And my guts no longer
knot,
Not unlike a bed of worms
that wobble like my jellied
knees,
These eyes, this smile
Just don't turn up the dial
(Turn me on, I mean)
I mean,
That fire couldn't last, could it?
And now, I miss our sticky hips.
Play peek-a-boo between your lips
Those teeth they tease me where
they once were bared.
I know the heat is not the
Whole, but holy
shit! Could you not spare one tender look?
That book
your nose is buried in will
harry me,
hurry me
Away from you
From you,
Your Highness
Whose highness lies in the cold neglect
Of a loyal friend
You were loved once, not caught in lust
But now
Fades th' embers to common dust.
When that blaze of passion passes
And my guts no longer
knot,
Not unlike a bed of worms
that wobble like my jellied
knees,
These eyes, this smile
Just don't turn up the dial
(Turn me on, I mean)
I mean,
That fire couldn't last, could it?
And now, I miss our sticky hips.
Play peek-a-boo between your lips
Those teeth they tease me where
they once were bared.
I know the heat is not the
Whole, but holy
shit! Could you not spare one tender look?
That book
your nose is buried in will
harry me,
hurry me
Away from you
From you,
Your Highness
Whose highness lies in the cold neglect
Of a loyal friend
You were loved once, not caught in lust
But now
Fades th' embers to common dust.
Cross
Vaguely explained extended metaphor time!
This soft sleep; a limbo backed by drumbeats.
My castle of warped flesh, a home where
I am suspended between something and nothing.
I've known
ghosts,
this world a primer for the next.
Shadows of love,
pain,
anger
carried to me on a river of blood
and for want of meaning I drink deeply of them.
Until the day the drumbeat quickens:
These shadows grow teeth,
each thundering beat
their bite
and I bleed, I bleed, each
cut
into my flesh weeping wild and
pulling me
forcing me
from my castle.
My lungs, warped and flat inflate,
and suddenly I am too, too solid.
My mouth opens and in one
triumphant scream
all my half-drunk shadows spill forth and
I grasp at air for comfort
till I am passed by rough hands
into the arms of the drummer.
This soft sleep; a limbo backed by drumbeats.
My castle of warped flesh, a home where
I am suspended between something and nothing.
I've known
ghosts,
this world a primer for the next.
Shadows of love,
pain,
anger
carried to me on a river of blood
and for want of meaning I drink deeply of them.
Until the day the drumbeat quickens:
These shadows grow teeth,
each thundering beat
their bite
and I bleed, I bleed, each
cut
into my flesh weeping wild and
pulling me
forcing me
from my castle.
My lungs, warped and flat inflate,
and suddenly I am too, too solid.
My mouth opens and in one
triumphant scream
all my half-drunk shadows spill forth and
I grasp at air for comfort
till I am passed by rough hands
into the arms of the drummer.
Are You Found? - a photo response poem
Every swollen belly
Sterile bed
And headstone
Pulls me back
To eight years old
And
The question why
To the first time
I saw my father cry
And the hummingbirds that
Carry your name on
Their wings
To my wasting rock
Whose arms are
Too fragile
To hold me
To the first time
I questioned God
The day I asked
Who holds the
Lost
And if they're ever
Found
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