Hopefully, the One Millionth and One Poem About Canadian Snow
It's okay not to know
who Al Purdy was.
He died
over twenty years ago,
and there's a professor
somewhere (let's say Toronto),
who would argue against me,
except they're too busy
reading the morning paper,
pretending the digital age isn't
turning dog ears
into another endangered species.
It's okay not to know
Canadians have written
thousands of (or are millions more impressive
for the five Americans who'll read this?)
poems about snow.
The most interesting ones seduced
by the space between snowflakes,
where bloodshot midnights
propose to the empty side of the bed
until there's nothing left
but to settle for sleep,
and they say Purdy was
an assisted suicide,
printed in an article long after
some of his poems went
out of print,
leaving a discarded “A Handful of Earth”
to lie on my shelf
like a lazy relative
I am too polite to question
about how much a poet earns.
Middle Aged Love Poem
At best, this poem is a broken sonnet,
while at worse, it helps us sleep,
like hugging a pillow at 1 AM,
only to wake up,
noticing the empty side of the bed,
yet still believing love
a tidal wave
instead of a toilet flush.
Passing Into the Darkness
Porch lights left on for no one
should make us smile
at the night sky,
even if we're scared to hope
for the stars to fail
at outshining a lover's stare
or at least for an angel feather
to tickle our retinas,
but instead we just pass by
trying not to think
about closed eyes,
with us on the wrong side,
and locked doors
everyone believes in
too much.
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