The
The red vowels, how they spill
then spell a sea of red
And the bright ships—
are they not ghost ships
And the bridge’s threads
against flame-scarred hills
And us outside
by other worlds
So
So the promise of happiness?
he asked a frog
then swallowed the frog
And the buzz of memory?
he asked the page
before lighting the page
And by night the sliding stars
beyond the night itself
A
A table erased
It is not realism makes possible the feast
Grey face turned away
Jam jar of forget-me-nots
Girl with gold chain
cinching her waist
But is it true
And what will become of us
As
As if the small voices—
one-erum two-erum
pompalorum jig
wire briar broken lock
then into and into
the old crow’s nest—
and so when young,
before all the rest
Crease
Crease in the snowy field
of evening within us
How the owl stares
and startles there
fashioning mindless elegy
So the remembered world’s
songs and flooded paths
This heap of photographs
This
This perfect half-moon
of lies in the capital
Crooks and fools in power what’s new
and our search has begun for signs of spring
Maybe those two bluebirds
flashing past the hawthorn yesterday
Against that, the jangle of a spoon in a cup
and a child this day swept out to sea
But
But the birth and death of stars?
The birds without wings,
wings without bodies?
The twin suns above the harbor?
The accelerating particles?
The pools of spilled ink?
Pages turning themselves
in The Paper House?
Soon
Soon the present will arrive
at the end of its long voyage
from the Future-Past to Now
weary of the endless nights in cheap motels
in distant nebulae
Will the usual host
of politicians and celebrities
show up for the occasion
or will they huddle out of sight
in confusion and fear
Camille Martin
http://www.camillemartin.ca
Rogue Embryo 