Surround a first kiss - Summer '98

Inspiration: I experienced the smile, the laugh, the engagement of the world by Wakefield poet Margaret Barker first dancing on a page then on a rideau river swan viewing bridge ... and life carried on around us ...

when the demonstrators finally got there

out straycatguardeddoor feet quickly wet of morning dew heart so full of sun horizon peeking climb to the drive still sleeping beneath yesterday's trash and sweat soon to steam again bakery buns window cooling here comes a bus down the hill wanting to runscreamlaunch but porch smokers eyes say slow turn the corner home coffee one button to the big outside where indonesian friends run supplies to parliament demonstrators my heart surges big tears pining peace.

for us all

eleven seventy seven - it's a good life

I went into the post office today
tried to close your mail box down
I had to turn in some keys.
To the lady with the frown.

That woman looked in the computer
and found your box
and gave me $11.77
?Go frigger

Well I took the money
I didn't say a word.
It's a wonderful life.
Or so I've heard

workshoping

scissors on the list though cut might slip
index cards opposed to the inscript
flip charts a rainbow pens of commercial fate
voice in mind to even out the plate

thick babmboo blues

maybe youre short
maybe you're tall
it doesn't matter
if you're holding the ball

maybe your're wide
or can hardly be seen
it doesn't matter
as long as you dream

don't be too thick
try to be lite
make sure you're in bed
by nine some nites

gotta like sunshine
gotta like rain
some times you gotta like
drivin'' that train

Au Pieds

Au pieds, quelques temps
En le silence precieux et le solititude. On regard.

Chitinous creatures of mighty power, six-footed Romans
Expertly manoeuvering a booty three times their size.
Beaded outlines of a trap so sturdy, so gluey, so final
For those hairy kazoo players
No one else wants.
Copper armoured reconnaisance vehicles with a million eyes the better to see you with,
Their delicate scanners assessing hazards on a surface oddly unfamiliar
but queerly warm, white and comforting.
Here they are. One ganglioned brain of diffuse topography,
the other an intense neuronal compaction
Of frightening and wonderful possibilities.
A meeting of molecules. A dim but infinite recognition: a deoxy encounter, variations of the same native lattice, the crystalline source,
these two microscopic threads briefly touch,
a tactile prayer in sacred memory of the Generator of Diversity.

birdtalk be brilliance

chirrup and let there be brilliance
for your morning bright.
sunlightshadowtightkeensight
brilliant chirrup morn for your night.
wings note

rain drips from slick leaves
porch floods
rubber boots
roots

dilly dálliance

those delicate,
transitory
soft
warm whispering evenings in sunset last night on the river,
birds finally cease their restless arguing,
fish snap water beetles with
gummy jaws,
deer flies at rest,
mosquitoes still

flavoured abs

head in your lap probably restless
to taste a fruit
and take home a hair

too humming loud

why's the desiel idling on my door
humming too loud

tattooed trucker pickin' up his ally date
drawin' a crowd.

take in the garbage - start another empty
that's all your allowed.

reconing nimblejill

imagined picnic table adventures waft dog pee
no threat i see

art by garden urban heaven sitting
gently temperant, only fitting

fresh we photied, voyaged - petites
for quiet nights, or diesel heat

hi honey

stick to it
fingers tongues tied

lick thru it
gourmet palate wide

swim in it
put the heat aside

lay on it
let your worries glide

salonging

dawn too hot to want
faded sarong screen burns still
nite fresh breeze long gone
nostalgia for the snow

shut the door awhile

this road
burns my feet
though i leap to shadows
i cannot stay in them

more than one day

i want to say goodnite
to help you close another day
and put some of the stresses behind
with a gentle touch.

but it is your dawn another day
to open and face not always free.

hours later also mine.
some things are certain.

most things take more than one day.

for the day’s art

To find the universal in the particular,
history in a moment
the future in now.
It is
discovering the infinite forms of beauty
through a lens of passion,
or a gift of divine enlightenment.
the unexpected key from heaven.

present fame

good luck with landmines,
especially those you can't see.
but don't let your anxiety
force you up a tree.

1000hhh1

if you hadn't tried
to invent some others
?where would we be now.

choosing this month's boy
or girl, or thinking how.

heavy as the silo graze.
precipitate some DNA's.
play full biochemical haze.....

the current batch looks all alike
the highest price just took a hike
?shall we say ?where would we be now.

spotting

how big the world seems
or appears sometimes flat
its not just a question
of ?why wear your @

in fact you can't pose one
you can't cloth one
you aren't own one

it could be an answer
small local close by
try sly two lips
for a taste, for an I

the honey pot

one paw in and falling
headlong in the irrestible treasure grove of art and fantasy
that is you.
sheer honey
to this forlorn bear.
i'm grabbed.

noon to tune by the moon

with not a damn with on it?
sounds like a tune.
but, could be,
soon.

the with or the tune? dunno,
tho' know I'm swoon.

unpinned but not homeless

Un-pinned, un-buttoned, un-alone
tho' not quite sewn up, done up or together
Time to find a needle and a thread.

cows and wives

If I DID have a wife,
I would want her to be kind, helpful, understanding,
witty and
to do all the paperwork and marketing.

morning

Sun is no longer willing to lurk
in Cloud's shadows
or hide in heris robes.
Burnt hems, skirtless or kiltless, as you like,
Cloud has skipped off.

while thawing some berries

resident starlings were already applying themselves
to ambitious nest projects under the eavestroughs
(one of them has GOT to be the now grown baby bird we adopted last summer).
bumblebees were in their formations and descending
for a major haul of nector from our blooming pink crabapple.
The crows gab talk, the squirrels argue, the sparrows debate

clams or mussels

What hands, nose, ears, mouth you have?
Yes,
body language,
the better to know you with.
Better be soon!
Let us hope there are no wolves in the woods

still floating

a nice long chat
but that was that
now it is now
want you in person anyhow

court taster

Costumes?
I'll take: jester, troubadour, enchantress, travelling jewish merchant, seer and the girl skipping rope.
If you'll let me, I'll take lover, friend and fencer.

It is all very hard.

Teetering around on slimey or crusty rock in a riverbed gone dry,
the slippery mud banks just out of reach.
No sign of water -- it was diverted elsewhere long ago,
so only a soft trickle here or there since,
now whispering, now gone.
Only way out is up the bank.

Recipe for a song

how small to let me carry it
recipe cards might do.
people would wonder ?what's cooking
and ?whose invited which few

how big to let me sing it
more likely us more likely wing it
while people wonder
?would they

Held hostage by six sick sheep

What other things you like,
Other than the bike?
Do they fit with the mike or
Do you take them on a hike?
Can you bite them, smell them, lick them, taste them
or
strum them, beat them,blow them, pound them?

Do they all fit together
No matter what the weather?
Like the branches of a tree
do they all add up to thee?

Copyright Notice © 1998 Meg Barker and Peter Gillies