Monday, March 29, 2010

premeditated

winnipeg is an aging grand piano with a bum key
who may never achieve her magnum opus










we've been waiting 80 years for Chicago North
but as our suburbs slug across the prairies,
the core cries for change, cries quickly swallowed by
decaying brick, whipping winds, eight month Winters

...and something else...



(the clang of change jangles in our chests with growing alarm and we get nervous)









the old are padding our streets with contented familiar trails
to the droopy apothecary that will never shut down,
the dusty grocer who always stocks kitty food next to the air-fresheners,
to the bakery where they still call them Matrimonial cakes,
and the coffee is always scalding and watery,
just the way they like it

they know something

they know their Winnipeg
they know it just as they knew it
80 years ago, and how it will be

80 years from now

and they know that we will never change it,
that we will maintain it
just the way they like it


(as another brick hits the pavement)


we innvotate

we plot our escape


summer invincibility
catapults us from
wintery incubation
and we colour the streets
with sound and art






and the old nod and smile






we drink to celebrate
then drink more to quell our fears
then even more to forget









then we wake up, dried out and older
the earth turns over one more time

another notch on the wall

and winter blows in

and we lie in bed
and we lie and we lie and we lie

until we believe we are fine










until the sun ceases assaulting our senses
and we rise and fall into a slumbery walk
drawn only to artificial lights and beer
and the warmth of whoever will hold us tonight

sleep to get to tomorrow.
sleep to ignore our dreams.

jangle jangle jangle

snooze

across the city
a congregation steeps in candles and incense
within the butressed dome of a stainglassed sanctuary

songs stirring within
songs being written and sung
to attack the blackness of despair

if you are willing
Lord,

you can set me free

Freeing One,
Freeing One

set me free,
set me free

and I shall be free indeed
and I shall be free indeed

and they exit into the night
refreshed

and they exit into the night
and get into their cars and they drive

and they drive through the night
to their homes

and they climb into bed and lie
and they lie and they lie
until they believe that they will be free
tomorrow

tomorrow,
i shall be free indeed
i shall be free indeed
i shall be free indeed
i shall be free indeed
i shall be . . .

jangsnooze!

Monday, March 22, 2010

Sunday, March 14, 2010

aftermath





it is morning.

banging my head on the sunlight
i said,
"___k."

another weekend ends in a foggy SKYY haze
of dispondancy

and i wake up to reel-ality
stomach lurching over piles of unwritten essays
and unsent resumes,
caught up in an existential inner monologue
about trees falling and the absence of honey bees




we brew y/our coffee
we write our CD reviews
we attend our art shows
we pay our cover charge










we pay your interest fees
and overdue fines
we design your posters
we pierce your skin with dragons
and 'mothers'




we powder your crepes
we fetch your movie rentals
we usher you through aisles
to find your seat or organic fruit
we clear your tables
sew your clothes
fashion your jewelery






paint your walls
adorn your mantles
trim your bonsais
DJ your socials








we mould your image
with hair cuts,
artwork,
new food,
travel stories,
VIP lists
and music selections,

and boost your water-cooler cred
with anecdotes
about a world you don't actually believe exists
(but desperately want to be part of)












for some reason
i am a failure at mathematics
and cannot grasp the formula
which was laid out for me in public school:




be born +
go to school+
graduate+
go to school+
graduate+
get a job+
pay taxes+
get married+
reproduce+
reproduce+
retire+
go on a cruise+
die

=

Life, so suck it



this is the American dream
and the American dream is alive
& it's dulling my spirit

i.
am.
an.
artist.

you steal my art.
you're stealing it right now.




the more you steal
the harder i work
to fulfill your vapid life

i.
am.
fucked.

i didn't choose this

Friday, March 5, 2010

freeze-frame stop on the number 1 HWY



http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/Main_Street_Bridge_Assiniboine_River.jpg

morning shuffles across the osborne street bridge
like the lone can collector across an empty vendor parking lot

smoke signals from my cigarette call across the street and are met with a nod

gravel trucks groan and spray dust over the bridge
mixing with the gurgling, burping assiniboine
like Nestle chocolate powder, a churning, frothy brown slough

i pause mid-bridge, step up onto the lower rung of the guardrail
and look down, lean over, lift one foot and let go
of my cigarette and watch it plummet to its extinction

it hits the river and for a moment seems to get stuck in the surface
and makes more of a dent then a 'sploosh'
before the water picks it up and takes it to the refuse graveyard
or wherever it is the river takes beer cans, rogue hubcaps, homeless mitts,
fallen sparrows, tattered hats, take-out boxes

if a broken soul, tired and dreamless, falls into the river
does anybody hear?

i pull myself back onto the sidwalk and continue toward the Leg
no real destination in mind; the vague notion that time might be moving
on the other side of the bridge draws left foot over right over left over right...
below me, i hear the water sigh, then stop.

breakfast smells hang down Broadway like forgotten street garland
tacky bears tilt their goofy heads and salute as i walk by
then snigger softly at my back

http://www.winnipegreflections.com/elements/images/bearsOnBroadway/bearsGroup.jpg

i am trapped in a concrete body
placed on the cold streets of Winnipeg with the winds and ice
chipping my paint, fading grey into the concrete hue

they laugh, perhaps, because i chose to be here
they laugh, maybe bitterly, because they did not.
and we walk by as time greys us, ignorning them
and they, once painted and seen, dissolve
just like us, and they are resentful at our reckless
misuse of time

a story begins to form in my head
and i stop my mindless stepping to pause
and follow the gaze of the bears into the clear blue sky
clouds shift to the south, and birds like planes and planes like birds
traveling to destinations assured, places where life happens
or so i imagine

in my head i am booking a flight
maybe to Paris, where art isn't an accent,
it's oxygen;
maybe to New York, where self-indulgent wandering
leaves you in the gutter;
maybe to the Middle East, where death is what happens
while you fight for your life,

or to Mexico where life is a party, a celebration of a hard day's work
with streets splashed with children, fruit, and spicey cocoa mole,
with reds, ochres, azures and silver, where agave plants grow with a promise
of tequila-infused celebration in the Zucolo tonight, just because...

a nail gun barrage of snow freezes my thoughts
and my eyes snap shut as i draw the collar up over my ears
with red hands, wet cheeks, suspended breath still too terrified
to venture another taste of the chilly air beyond my clamped teeth and lips


as i enter the Fyxx i imagine a bell dinging overhead
announcing my arrival to be met by cheery 'hellos'
but instead i await my coffee as diners silently sip and snack on cookies
as surely sleepy servers, backs turned, move rags over that same stain
hypnotized, until i cough and they see me, dripping
by the till with racoon eyes.

we are all about the same age.
we stare briefly at one another
as though registering our present states
after a deep and dreamy sleep
and seeing reflections of our reality
in one another.

our resumes are written
but unprinted;
our music is recorded
but unmastered;


our poems are composed
but unpublished;
our photos have been snapped
and trapped in Facebook purgatory;


our paintings are hung
but remain unsold;
our degrees have been issued
but unclaimed;
the trees have been planted
but we will return next year;
we've moved in together
but grow tired of each other;



our ideas burst with the Spring
but by Winter they have lost their steam;




the drinks have been poured then drunk,
the venues filled then emptied,



and time skips over the assiniboine
because it has to. there's nothing here for it to do
but steal our youth and fuel its journey onward



tomorrow i will join time
just like i said i would yesterday