My column in this week’s Winkler Morden Voice and Altona Rhineland Voice newspapers.

Everyday
Is a series of photos
In an album called life
Snapshots captured as
Studies in dark
Studies in light
Shadows as memories
Cast upon our walls
Telling our stories
To the ones brave enough
To wander our gallery
Perchance to leave
Images of their own
Behind.

and i see
reminders of the past
like autumn leaves
blazing before me
as visions in a fire
falling to the ground.

what will become of them
as they are buried
and turned to mulch?
will they nurture
a new and brighter future
whose roots go deep
or will they moulder away
signifying the death of all things;
things that were, are and could be?

for we know this much:
all that was, might create
a bright and new-felt day
or descend to bitter darkness –
of crushed hopes in decay.

What do we do

When the we becomes he

Or the we becomes she

What do we do

When what once was three

Becomes two, or one…

When the we becomes

Just me?

When we feel as if

We don’t know how to be

Without the we

That once was

Because

You put so much you

Into that beautiful we.

I do not know

I cannot see

Or perhaps

Maybe

I  will not

I cannot pay the cost

Of knowing

For knowing

Doesn’t come for free –

There’s always a fee…

One more lost day

In a series

Of lost days

Living as if

We were endless

Squandering the time

As if there would always

Be moments

Moments to squeeze

Every last drop of joy

From one another

Before the clock runs down

And we find we have died

Alone in our beds

Senseless

And without.

Mornings are getting lighter
As spring approaches
Bringing lantern sun
gleaming off her azure cloak
To peel back secretive night
Revealing all the invisible things
Done in the pre-dawn dark
Sent scuttling into black crevices
To hide from the bright skies
And all the witnessing eyes
More comfortable in blackness
Blind and pale beneath the earth
Away from any soothing warmth
That might stir the heart to beat
Awakening courage that lay dormant
In the grasping, straight-jacket silence.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a column in support of Pembina Valley Pride bringing pride to Winkler with the hope it would be met with love. Here is a letter received in response. P.S. Nothing deceptive about the stats in the column…