Poems
Poetry is a challenging art form, especially if the rules of a specific poetic form are followed. Hence, I practise, take courses, seek feedback from readers, and have a growing reference library. To date, I have studied under Canadian poets Chelene Knight, Catherine Graham, and Allan Briesmaster. My poems have been published in print and online in North America, the UK, and Australia. Please enjoy these samples.
In Print
How did an Iron Age textile end up in a bog?
The Orkney Hood
Raindrops and dew overfill a lochan
in the heather-silent bog,
a gloaming space,
a beckoning place
where a dun-coloured hood enters an opening out of time
—a child’s cowl let fall by grieving hands.
Moon upon moon upon moon,
low clouds swaddle it,
moss and sedge shield it
from the curlew’s spirit-wailing
and the charms of the night-scented orchid.
Moon upon moon
till men flaying a bank in fog-filled air
cleave its sepulchre—
—light and heat and incense of heather pour out!
wilder than a tempest, sharper than a dagger.
A hell-spirit not, but the cowl,
glowing, gilded, glorious.
Hand-shadows, too,
sleek with lanolin.
Fingers pluck fleece from moorit ewes
pull out bracken bits
drop spindle whorls
ply yarn
thread looms, throw shuttles,
weave two-by-two twill for the hood’s pixie-pointed peak,
chevron bands for the shoulders, neck.
And the fringe—oh, the fringe!
pea tendrils long as a lamb shank:
fourteen-hundred fine woolen threads
twenty-one thousand twists
three-hundred-and-fifty catkins that once circled a chieftain’s waist,
reworked for the curls of a peedie red-head.
Prompted by Rumi’s last couplet in “Because of you, I burn with sorrow, O God."
Unarmed Resistance
Rumi called out, be silent and observe the world,
be a seeker of the purpose of the world
Tell me, I replied, a spoon has a purpose, a pot
—to comfort, sustain in the service of the world,
but what is to be found in the rubble and ash
where bellies are denied the surplus of the world?
I went silent, eyes wide, and what did I observe?
Roiling, boiling slag from the furnace of the world
and love poems of nightingales, ruby-clad roses
that mask darkened stains on the surface of the world.
Cast-off ruffs, red foam noses, and oversized soles
—are we naught but clowns in the circus of the world?
Master, you knew Light in the broken and absurd;
Lace my wine with opium: propose me to your world.
A forested lot on Cape Chin Road North goes up for sale.
Poets Considering Moss
rocks…threatened from underneath by moss in lovely hell-green flames
"Brazil, January 1, 1502”— Elizabeth Bishop
afterwards I always felt mean…as if I had committed, against the whole
scheme of life, a desecration
“Moss-Gathering”— Theodore Roethke
August rains. Forest mosses beckon us
exactly as they must have beckoned you,
every square inch of woodland floor gone green
—frog green, hunter green, pickle green,
olive, kale and shamrock,
occasional mustards, golds and bronzes,
miniscule capsules borne on blood-red stalks.
Impossible mantle
blanketing rot and rock and soil
under spindly spruce and aspen trees
that took hold once the loggers had their way,
lining ditches where orchids bloom
in June for those who know,
hosting the cedar’s seedlings, the stolons
of the wild strawberry. After rain, pure cobalt tops the trees,
poplars pulse with water,
woodpeckers tapping time—
sounds that are no sounds.
We walk, we see
how green hangs
like a tablecloth from crags
or caps a cedar stump,
shins up a living trunk
with anchor hairs concealed in matted sponge.
Still, in the foreground blue jays squawk and scold,
insist on what is theirs, lay claims
like the bright orange ribbons
marking off the land for sale,
the luscious lot
that slopes up from the shore
with moss so green
it swallows up the honeyed sun,
so deep
it gleams all afternoon
—mustard, copper, bronze—
miniscule capsules borne on jet-black stocks.
Unbroken mantle.
Impossible.