New
Life says the truck in front of me all the way
from Harriston to
London.
I follow.
My wipers can
barely keep up with the sleet.
I pump the blue
liquid; I can’t see.
Then I see.
New Life says the truck.
The fog in the city
is thick.
The rain, the
dreariness.
Five solid months
of work ahead of me.
This morning when
I opened the door
the orange stray
was a blaze
of ribbon out of
the darkness into the house.
How long had the
cat coiled,
coaxing the door
open?
The first person I
talk to after we break up:
Your lights, I
say, pointing to his headlights.
They turn
themselves off, he says.
The cat too let
herself out
as resolutely as
you.
Harriston to London
my window’s fog
and the passing
trucks
kick sleet over my
car
and I can't see
New Life just
ahead.
Is an urchin
split wide
I want inside
the soft anemone
flesh of your lips.
Love’s slippery
noun rolls over
lands on its feet again
bellies hands feet
swim like prepositions
but breathing gives it away
sinks like fish-line
lead-shot into Georgia Strait.
The sound you hear
is me in hip-waders
across the salt flats.
The sucking noises are rubber
soles.
Marsh mud the heavy bind
of other, older mud.
I move into the stretch of land
rounding your shoulder
like the servant in the fairy tale.
The bands riveting his heart
burst apart with happiness.