POETRY

2022 Emerging Young Artist Competition

Time

Sometimes in life, things do become boring.
And also, prickly - like the thorns on a rose.
We don't realize the minutes are soaring,
And with time, everything grows.
Life will disintegrate, time will perish--
So you see—time does cost.
In our minds, memories we should cherish.
Because if it's wasted... it's all lost.

Age 13, Budding Writers, TDSB

Poetry on Lake Simcoe

We were oceans apart when I met you
On my way to a blackened hell
You swept by me
A wingless angel
And pulled me up
To keep me from sinking
I sat on invisible alae
Stunned by your strength
You carried me to loftier dreams
While I scattered old dead skin
Like fragile snowflakes
Pale white shells
Floated down
Lighting up the sky
And drifted from memory
Like a cold winter song
Skimming dancing flitting
As broken pebbles do
We smiled and wondered
On whose tongue they would fall

A Path for Trees

here’s a photograph of two rows of trees
And in between a path like a road
Cosseted by the fleece of falling snow
Impressed on us alone

I wonder how we can say with certainty
The trees were planted in this fashion
Or why we choose to imagine a footpath
Carved for us alone

When at the end of the open living space
Our eyes are deceived by shadiness
Under rows and rows of further pines
Fixed for us alone

Nothing is said of our trodden thoughts
Expect nothing on the far-off walk
Except for the long and lone way out
For us and us alone

Beautiful Vagabonds

I am not the piston in the flower or
The bulging seed throttled by pollen
But a separate figure expectant and
Cupped by the shape palms make
Holding sumptuously to the fragile
Killings – crickets, bees, and moths
The soulful water strider apparently
Impervious to deep mirrored waters
And the lotus lilies rooted in mire
Look up at me
Look into me
I am the wind-loving swallow
Lighter than the air itself
Rippling my whole transience
Renascent by the threat of rain

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Starbucks

#293 printed on Starbucks cups for
The Way I See It initiative.

Demise of Her

shhh
below me
somewhere
sidling stealthily
is a small, sullen speck
rearranging pictures of me
replacing me with shadows
perfecting most of my poses
slithering, slinking, slowly
she is frivolous, and fierce
she spies at the window
slyly, smugly by herself
snooping, staring
she is below me
sticking to walls
singing and smiling
consoled by her voice
sullying my space with
her serpentine presence
she will never know
she can never be me
because way down
below me, she
doesn't exist

Canadian Moose

Florence loves to smile from her bald toothless head.
Her thick fleshy body pushes out against constricting clothes.
She waddles in and out of stores looking at clerks.
Her jelly smile rests on you for a moment,
Then without deliberation,
Sinks quickly back into its asinine grin.
Volatile, catapulting threats, mocking you with her eyes,
She disarms you.
Wanton streetwalker of a time long ago,
She now sails proudly through the crowds
Flashing her low deep fatty chest,
Waiting for applause,
Wanting to be photographed.
She is the moose you see strewn along Bloor Street.
Emblem of our city, she stands erect,
Taunting, parading her flag, claiming the streets,
Laughing at the silliness of it all.

Seasons

one day we’re at the beach
floating against a passing tide
on a yellow mat and blue horizons
your eyes catlike describing to me
with few words what magic means
a wisp of dog catches the sideline
cottonwood puffs airy as sunshine
cascading around our shoulders
just when everything is in transit
to wake beside you one minute
your warm limbs against mine
a smile spreading in your bed
the summer to live for
i want now tomorrow
to play catch today
falling in sand dunes
burying our last wish
in a place of tiny lakes
and the next day empty
as if we were never here