Consider Ye the Upthrust Pearl

Now pause in passing, stop to dwell
Upon the homes and places here;
And listen, close, to what they tell
Of dreams the hearts of others cheer
That form the stars above the well
Of inky blackness mortals steer.

In what they have and what they build,
Behold what they aspire to;
The rough-edged lives they seek to gild
Are thought too plain to be in view.
When time has all the embers chilled,
Small souls depart the shells they grew.

Consider ye the upthrust pearl:
How little it enriched the world.

listen with my eyes

crosstalk
by the trees
she wants me to know she's thought of me
her words detach and float to the ground,
___the blazing summer in which they blossomed over

i listen with my eyes
gazing up into the sticks that rake the sky
infect the clouds with pus to fall as snow at my feet
___when she is safe and warm in some far
______elsewhere
the wind stirs it all,
___leaves and words and marionettes

Ark

Unbridled by
___control skins
The leaf the water
___seed and grass
______embrace me
The smallest knowing
___nothing hidden: shared
And the ultimate way
___is back where you came from
Don't condemn
___don't back away
___It will all be this way
______Soon.

Snake in the grass

My cock plays tricks on me
___Tells me things about you
___my heart and head deny
I want so much to believe

One more time; one last
___tilt at the gates of Eden

Cast

She nominated me:
___be my anchor
___keep me from drifting
______ or cresting the falls
Night and day, point of reference
___ she might circle and list
___ but never founder

Came the day of a new wind
___ bright and sunny
______ compass clouds pointing
___ ______to the future
___ She filled her sails with him
_________ broke the chain
___ I watched her wake spread
______ foam and lace
___ from below

Before the Lines Came

He walked
the steal-held land
___unbounded
___before the Lines came
Countries
___counties
______concessions

Driven iron come alive
___turning there to here
______that to this
___halving what was whole
___joining what was strange

He walked
the indivisible divided
___mindful thus
______all around him insane:

______Flags on the moon

Free of the Land

___Born in the church,
She was married out of wedlock
___Never saw the day she didn't night

The whole west production
___Brought her everything she wanted
And everything she wanted was in sight

___Owe, how they waited
To be ushered to her exits
___And manicure themselves in all her charm

And lingering behind her
___In somnambulistic chill
They winter-watched him take her by the arm.

northhumber

cool white plying blue
warm blue carving grey from green
we were naked then

LCBO journey vignettes

1
paved with gold

long line
___like geese
___like Beatles
leaves cross the street
___pirouetting
___like Trudeau sans the Queen
wishing they'd hold tight
not ready for fall.

2
hold my licker

Went to the licker store
Got myself some licker
I needed that — had a good, stiff tall one
helps me sleep
a good licker'll do that
___every time
wish I could manage it on my own
maybe one day

3
great rift valley

in sandals
___She walks before me
___with each step
___a split second
___bares her heel
like something
___primal
______forbidden
ceaseless
___sensual
______slap
_________slap
____________slap

'midst straight lines and steel
concrete and clock knives
it really doesn't take much.

seventh day five and dime

god's wife come into the store
sez i overcharged her on bananas
well i didn't but whattayah gonna say
___it's god's wife
i don't need no trouble
so i give her the difference
she buys an apple
___y'know one bloody apple
meeting a friend for lunch she sez
and slithers off
(she might be god's wife but i never liked her)

Pissing on the moon

I stood there
so did he
black water rippling, trees ghost-sided
all dusted white by soft light blast
sand still warm
on the tide’s retreat

He said
Look what I can do
baring himself to summer’s black eye
golden arches flying
reaching
straining
all the thrust of modest rockets
laughing, splashing my toes

Pissing on the moon
and more adventures
before the sun comes up

Severed

Padge packing in this jukebox hullabaloo
Padge packing in this Crisco-slippy moment
Padge packing, and all is well
Padge packing up a severed limb that was our life

There’s the train
What’s the province?
You don’t have to tell me, no
But maybe we could say hello sometime
Don’t forget me. Yeah, sure, I’ll write

As idly said, this home don’t miss the master

She has a skylight

She has a skylight.
Invites me over.
We gaze up at it.
Daylight streaming;
___bright blue sky, relentless

She says,
“Sometimes I sleep out here,
___just to look up at it.”
And I say,
“You’ll have to invite me over
___sometime
___I’d like to see that.”

She never did.
Not me, anyway.
I wonder what eyes
___saw what constellations
___through that sweat-fogged eye.

Cleveland 1996

he rose from her
lifting all but his sweat
at her urging
___she turned over, pillaring
and she instructed:
"maybe you should
fuck me
like an animal"
______i know
______i saw
______i was there
so he
fucked her
like an animal
___then it was my turn

later, she watched

The NEW Richard III

______ ______INT. A MEAD HALL IN MEDIEVAL ENGLAND

______ The merry court of HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND.

______ Enter LORD STANLEY and RICHARD III.

______ ______ ______ LORD STANLEY
______ ______ ______(introducing RICHARD III)
______ ______ Your Majesty, the Pretender.

______ ______ ______ RICHARD III
______ ______ _How wrong thou speakest, assface.

______ ______ ______ HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND
______ ______ _What seekest thou, bag of douche?

______ ______ ______ RICHARD III
______ ______ _Forsooth, thou who wouldst of thine
______ ______ _own father a cuckold make, I thence
______ ______ _me here to rap.

_____________________ HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND
______ ______ _First mindest thy tongue, then on
______ ______ _with it gettest.

_____________________ RICHARD III
______ ______ _Thou art, and no mistake, a man
______ ______ _possessed of not one asshole, but a
______ ______ _multitude thereof; and moreover,
______ ______ _grapevines have it that they each
______ ______ _and every one abetteth thee in
______ ______ _thine interloping of my 'hood.

_____________________ EARL OF OXFORD
______ ______ _What of it, dung-addled?

_____________________ HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND
______ ______ _Hold! He speaketh unto me.

_____________________ RICHARD III
______ ______ _Aye, and verily too. Indeed,
______ ______ _methinks thou wouldst pretend,
______ ______ _presume, pre-empt thyself — and
______ ______ _this company of those who do most
______ ______ _assuredly sup upon John Thomases —
______ ______ _unto my very crib!

_____________________ HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND
_______________Enough!

______ He advanceth upon RICHARD III.

_____________________ HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND (CONT'D.)
__________________ (reciting, as if a spell)
______ ______ _A cap in thine ass shall poppèd be,
______ ______ _when next we meet, and worried be
______ ______ _thine underlings, to see thee fall,
______ ______ _who hail from Sodom, one and all.
______ ______ _With glee shall I unbloom thy rose,
______ ______ _and unto me collect thy hos.
______ ______ _So mark me well! and bide thy time!
______ ______ _till by me rendered bones and slime.
______ ______ _Begone!

_____________________ RICHARD III
______ ______ _Be thou fed upon dung! I am away.

______ Exit RICHARD.

_____________________ LORD STANLEY
______ ______ _Alas, we are diss'd!

_____________________ EARL OF OXFORD
______ ______ _What for this, o my king? Surely
______ ______ _we will not suffer yon sorry man
______ ______ _bitch-issued, wherewithal he hath
______ ______ _said, to get away?

_____________________ HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND
______ ______ _Nay, fear not; I spake not in haste
______ ______ _nor jest; neither took I the piss.
______ ______ _This very night shall his ass be
______ ______ _kickèd, and up shall his shit be
______ ______ _fuck'd, by this manly host here
______ ______ _about me.

______ ALL cheer.

_____________________ HENRY, EARL OF RICHMOND
______ ______ _To arms, dear friends! Let ye the
______ ______ _locking and also unto it the
______ ______ _loading be done! Mount up, and
______ ______ _gallop by vile Richard's posse, and
______ ______ _by so doing shall we waste him and
______ ______ _those thereabout, and be thus
______ ______ _avenged! To arms!

______ Exeunt, ALL cheering.

_________________________________HERE ENDETH THE SCENE.

July, Long Lost

So late that
___TV's gone to bed,
___ ___I roam the house
___ ___ ___to find instead
that freedom reigns:
___no job, no school
___ ___no waking mind
___ ___ ___to set a rule

___ ___but mine.
___ ___How fine

a thing it is:
___the darkness heard
___ ___the silence seen
___ ___ ___the voiceless word
and in the street,
___with none to see,
___ ___the moon eclipses
___ ___ ___just for me.

Enniskillen

Proud and emerald-fired
Formed of souls shamrock-hued
___and fed on words, words
She smiled at him

Him, from beyond, away,
One of
___them
Took his hand
___Let out those
___words,
___ ___words
New ones poured in like tea,
___hot, delicious
___ ___needed

What mattered
the colour of souls;
___alabaster all in the sight of God
And when the Somme offered his up
She took their daughters
___wild geese
___ ___across the sea

Original Sin (Personal Instance)

Kind
he was and
grandfather
___(not mine,
___so grandfatherly)
Set to be inoffensive
___Iron-firm, silver-haired
___like a man on TV
A mighty orchid
___and I,
___a happy bee

And I loved, too
___the little stream
___ ___that carved his land
___ ___imagine! to own a stream!)
___ ___like hot fudge across an ice cream plain
___Fascinated:
___ ___the little paddle wheel he'd made
___ ___held by rocks
___ ___a toy that turned and turned,
___ ___ ___spun by nature

I dared, like Prometheus
___I touched it; it broke
___tipped from its stones
___and stopped

I ran

Cried

Hid

Fearful he knew
___(how could he not?)
Imagining his rage
___(how could he forgive?)
Dreading his hate, I
___never returned

Did he wonder,
___where's the bee?
When he fixed the wheel,
___as surely he did,
___in seconds,
___did he do it for me,
___ ___wanting it to be right for my enjoyment?

I never looked him in the eye again.
___Afraid to be penitent
___Short-selling his mercy
___ ___I robbed us both.

Hardwood Maple

There crouched in all resilience
___in autopsy
___the dead snow rotting
___the birds back to peck its carcass

Fingertipped unmittened blue
___the iron clank swing set chains up the hill
___not wanting to wait
Thunderstorms broken on the rocks
___but healing
______hungry

Locks picked by wind
___lifted from young eyes
______whispered the furnaced It:
______fat appled limbs
______frolic salt-stainery
______unshod field tipped tricycle
___So I listened
______believed

The sap ran down me
___mourning six-armed
______glazing the sun so I could eat it
______hot off the griddle,
______blue unending

Hardwood maple—
___bone-knotted
___tear-keyed
___blond-leafed
—learns to wait

The View from Prospect Way

Michael Trenton
1528 Prospect Way, Apt. 411
Richmond, Virginia
AM6 LB7

Flight Lt. Robert Trenton
Landing Base Mimico
Toronto-Negawaya, West Niagara District, New York
FV6 KS2


June 16th, 1966

Dear Bobby,

Yesterday a flock of passenger pigeons flew over the city and I thought of you. That time in Stellarton Park just after Uncle Henry passed away, remember? You said to me they were the souls of the departed and that one of them was him, somewhere in there. You know, I don't think I've eaten a single one since you said that. The ones I saw yesterday must have taken a quarter hour to cross the sky, heading north. Folks here are saying it's a good omen. I hope they're right. Maybe it's Uncle Henry watching over us.

I'm getting used to life in the national capital, but the drive from Richmond to Franklin and back every day is still pretty taxing on me. Still, this is what I always wanted, right? Let me save you the trouble of saying 'I told you so'. I wouldn't trade it for the world. Much as I miss home sometimes, there's so much history here. So much of importance. So much is going on all the time. Especially these days. I was there, you know, for the emergency session of Congress two weeks ago, doing whatever Rep. Nichols needed done. There, in the Roundel itself when they opened the session. I can tell you without shame that as they rose to sing Heart of Oak , the hundreds of them, men and women from every corner of the British Republic, I had tears in my eyes. I've never felt it so strongly as I did right then. At that moment, I was ready for anything.

As far as negotiations go, I wish I had better news for you, and everyone else in uniform. The French seem eager to play last month's incident off Haiti for everything it's possibly worth to them. It's all a trumped-up excuse, of course; they've never given up their aspirations to getting New Orleans back. All of you back home must be watching the French and Ottawa Rivers with a chill down your backs these days. Everybody here is focused on New Orleans, but people like us know the thing they most after that is to see West Niagara annexed from New York and back in New France. Fancy a king, Bobby? Might give our rough little corner of the Republic some glitter, if you don't mind losing habeas corpus and having to tithe to the Catholic Church every time you buy so much as a stamp. I thought all this was over in our grandparents' time, but here we are on the brink once more.

Still… it's not over yet, or even begun. So here's my big news… from the national capital to the federate. That's right, I'm off to London next week with Rep. Nichols for the emergency meeting of the Senate. We'll be asking for the backing of the Federate Allies. Ordinarily that would go without saying but India's been so balky lately. If we don't get their support, it will encourage France, and we could be in big trouble. But with their support, I can't imagine France will think it wise to push the matter to the brink.

I've never been to the Union of the Isles. How many times have I been back and forth across the American march, from the St. Lawrence to the Columbia? Two dozen? But I've never been to the European march or the Australian. Well, finally, off I go. England. London. Another front line, staring across that channel at the very original frontier between us and them. A chance to see the ancient imperial city, with all of its old royalist history and splendor. I only wish it were under happier circumstances. I imagine I'll find the people there worrying themselves over a repeat of the French Incursion. Those awful years. It might have been almost 200 years ago but it's still with them. You can hear it in the voices and the remarks of the representatives from the Isles in Congress. They'll be out in force burning the Freddies this autumn, I'm sure. I wonder if I'll still be around to see that. It's hard to believe we Britons were once as proud of having a king as the French are. It seems so backward. Well, here's to King Frederick, roasting down in hell; at least he did us the service of breaking us of that obsession.

Naturally, I'll take a lot of pictures, which I will force on you and Jenny and the kids, and Mom and Dad, when I'm home for Thanksgiving, or if I can't make that, Christmas, at least. God willing, we'll all be meeting in peacetime, not war, when we do so. If India and Federate Africa will stand by the Union of British States, we certainly will. Without their help, it promises to be a long, cold, anxious winter.

I hope the next time I see a passenger pigeon, it's Uncle Henry with good news.

Wish us luck in London! I should be back in Franklin by September, if all goes well. All my love,

Mike.