Red-winged blackbirds
Call it summer, call it promise, call it radio from a Dodge patiently polished. We lay on our backs in the sun that month, holding vigil for September. CLICK ON THE RECORDING TO LISTEN
Train coming around the tracks
The silence was the most disturbing part. The whole world standing staring at these metal sinews tripped and quick-frozen. Now with summer at its heaviest, the air burning with the ingratitude of August and the back-and-forthing of combines. There’s been much hail — we’ve huddled tsk-tsking, watching the sky like a felon. What did we…
Dawn chorus with geese
The birds and the reeds and the morning cows knee-deep in muck. Empty bleachers where the sky used to live. CLICK ON THE RECORDING TO LISTEN
Corral gate
Home is horseflesh, this salty lick across the prairies. A silver sky threatening rain. Home is these empty barns and the trail, still warm. CLICK ON THE RECORDING TO LISTEN
Auction
The way it goes so fast. All the neighbours out to pick over the bones. The old men wincing. Text on the button
Spruce Fire in a Wood Stove
We are reading poetry, you and I, and I am learning by rote the topography of your neck. My fingers memorizing your hidden rivulets and beautiful bones. Time stops but for the falling of snow, the muttering of the fire, the urgency of birds. Text on the button
Pop Goes the Weasel
Round and round go the songs in my heart. Mechanical surprise. CLICK ON RECORDING TO LISTEN
Heavy Rain off the Eaves
One man’s voice, a cat at home curled up on the paper and a phone bill overdue. Him, his voice, suddenly there, like a reflection in glass, a hand on your shoulder, and the wind is inside me, in the cage of my chest, swelling. One man’s voice. No greater than another’s. And perfect…
Frothing Milk
Sun on skin, we lizard in this clearing, two cups of coffee and an orange between us. It’s something I read once, that love is sharing an orange, and so we do, popping the sections into our mouths, into the dark places between words. CLICK ON THE RECORDING TO LISTEN