saw the imprints of residential school

left buried brutally on your face

black and blue and bleeding

from the fists of the man it broke –

i was just five years old,

and we called him dad…

and these ghosts don’t die

one day

we will be ash

and float free

disentangled from ourselves

and this binding world,

drifting apart

even from our very selves,

silent and asleep

in the dark.

no matter how fast

the bullet train is

from Tokyo to Hokkaido

it will never reach

the speeds it once had

when the universe was new

nor the speeds

it one day will;

and the passengers

watching the quiet towns race past

on a warm night in Japan

know nothing of

where they have been

and where they are going

forever past and future

when every blade of grass

and every silk worm

and the kimonos of their work

took cosmic flight

nigh near as fast and bright as light.

dry leaves are a whirl

beneath a cooling afternoon sun

bright in the blue October sky

and cat cannot tell

if it is an attack

or simply the grinding death dance

of autumn scraping across the ground

tracing circles that betray the wind

as we sit content

while the world dies

a metaphor for life

in jeans and grey shirt

in turquoise and black boots

quietly in love

at what cost

to the wielding hand

when staunch defense

becomes wind whipped

and brutal vengeance?

who pays heartless blood

with soulless obliteration

returned a thousand fold

amidst the groaning sighs of Kaddish

pain-mingled with Salat al-Janazah

while hate grows like a field of weeds

as expansive as the waterless desert?

only the dead and the dead at heart

in memory of the ones who no longer care;

and all the voices sound the same

as they wail and rail beneath a pale sun

that rides forth indifferent to the tears,

only the dead and the dead at heart

at the cost of a life lived and a beating heart.

poems are not poems,

not anymore;

they are pithy bullets

of syrupy self-love,

projectiles of encouragement

fired deep into your brain

to the centre of gratification,

perfect for a poster

on your wall –

“Hang in there baby!”

we’re not afraid

that the world is haunted,

that we are possessed

by a legion…

we’re afraid that it’s not,

that we are the only ghosts

hiding in the attic…

alone.

olive clings to mother vine
and grows and grows and grows
ripening in the life’s good sun
until time comes to tear it away
and crush the gold from its flesh
that we might be nourished
in the oils of sacrifice
like ritual sanctification

sometimes i wake up

to an enormous sense of loss

and i wonder –

how much did i leave behind

in these unknown worlds

i may never see again?