when I was younger
I clung to you
the roots of a tree
gripping the riverbank

shifting waters
could not move us

enveloped by mosquito netting
and protected from the outside
while balmy breezes blew
within a decrepit shanty

the cracks would not let in
the pain

shards of light reflecting
mirror side up
bruised forearm, broken finger

I cannot find you
in your dark
hidden by your rage
I search for you

the splashing, laughing pool
flipping through the pages
of a torn photo album

you call out to me from your
hiding place
a quiet voice beneath the fists
loving pain, gentle brutality
comforting violence

sometimes, glimpses of you emerge
falling rain, glimmering laugher
and I hope for your light

shards of light reflecting
mirror side up

my image in your eyes
my movements in your stance
quiet rage
shifting below

whispering madness seeps into light
mosquito netting, broken finger
morning grass, afternoon tag
and I remember you
as you were, as you are now

soft folds of a blanket
and the radio hums within the hut
hammock swaying
cradled in the softness
protected in the netting

and I can see you as you are now

soothing cooling
ointment glides on the burn
healing tissue replacing cut
a soft scar
in the shadow of forgiveness

and I can see your light

An assembly line inspects product to
ensure polices and mandates are upheld,
to secure preservation and enhancement of product line.
Product stuck in static quo,
kept in check through routine authenticity
examinations. Product restraint by closed spaces,
surface scarred boxes- imprinted with assumptions
in two official languages-for classification purposes.

The quiet minutes
after the buzz of an alarm
and the moment before eyes open
Awake into a world
that moves indifferently
to your presence

Try to capture nothingness
hold to the empty spaces
between sleeping and waking
Vast liberty
while the burden of independence
keeps the flesh in place

Nine more minutes
before the snooze alarm
and the body lies warm
in the folds of a blanket
the sheets that cradle
the light weight of humanity
but then it comes
palpitations
from the cold grains of knowing:
this world will continue to beat on
in the face of your anxiety

Eight minutes
before the cold draft of moving
air through this dark room
seeps into floorboards
touches the underside of footing
Waiting for the moment
when you understand
your place in this world

Seven minutes
before the long walk down a darkened hallway
holding the fleecy robe
against tentative flesh

Six minutes
before the sore return to safety
before knowing the loneliness of

the five minutes
before disrobing the garment
that shields
the very nakedness of a spirit

that four minutes ago
laid in the comfort of
a disentangled heart, of an unfettered mind

The clock winds down
and the slipping of time
slopes at an incline of despair
because three minutes remain

A yearning arises for that silence of mind
returning to the hazy fields of sleep
that vision of dreamlike possibility
a potential that expands beyond
the nocturnal chains of clarity

Two minutes moves over you
a caress that brims with sorrow
because the final minute is here
and eyes must open to the glaring noise
of wakefulness

A surrender that lasts
between dreaming and waking
the moment when you are free
before stepping from imagined colour
into the reality of shaded contours

Embrace a solitude
that can only know its place
between dreaming and waking

You—an image—that I hold
close to my chest.
A chest that heaves an uprising
of foam, mucus, air,
bubbling forth from a vacuous
maze of uncertainty.

We shuffle through the immaculate lies,
groomed and bridled to yesteryear.
In the distance, the golden ticket
within an endless circumference,
an eternity encased in fine binding.

The hard metal of expectation
leaves water rings on the
unfinished oak table that was
commissioned to unite two beings.

We willed it to be so,
but willing does not perpetuate reality.
Willing only strains against the
selves, that shell of flesh, that
fragile center.

Imperfection marked by
a twitching eye, the fine pinprick of pain
manifesting from doubt to the
certain realization
of a misshapen circle.

Beings created from ideas of who we should be,
but not what we actually embody.
For how can one join to another,
unfinished in oneself,
produced from good will and sacrifice of the self
to be world for another?

Equally progressing in divergent axis
running parallel,
but never touching, never joining
in the commonality of pursuits.

Obtuse angles, acute separation
leaves us as an anomaly
striving for a common union
based on uncommon ends.

Image courtesy of owaief89 at flickr.com

The Boar Coffeeshop Podcast VII

Download the podcast

What up team?! We’re back (finally)!

That’s right, you heard correctly, the podcast is up and running again with fresh new voices and delicious new poetic grooves. Veronica Fredericks and I (being Jamie) have usurped control of the podcast from the hands of the dearly missed Philip and will be updating it on a regular basis.  Really, if the podcast were a recently widowed cougar, Veronica and I would be the Claudius to Phil’s Hamlet Senior.  But don’t you worry, because Hamlet Junior (played by the lovely Nokyoung Xayasane) will be sticking around to keep it real and levy empty death threats upon us!  Try not to think too hard about that analogy because I know that I certainly didn’t.

Anyway, as I mentioned before, expect us on a semi-regular basis.  We’re thinking that we’ll be around once every two weeks, with next week being the exception.  In light of the coming G8/G20 summit being held in the Big Smoke, we will be focusing next week’s podcast on that event.  Further, we will be bringing in spoken word artists to lay down some truth for us for during the podcast.

I think that is about it.  More details will follow as they become clear and the haze of fatigue lifts.

Hugs and kisses,

- Jamie and Veronica

P. S. – Jamie, here.  I will give a cookie to the first person to e-mail to coffeeshop@theboar.ca listing every single word that I mispronounce.  Seriously.

Break in, to a world of
pride, open the door to
a new life. Breathe out
lasting moment, tumble
and fall, wind to
store motion
sickness from turning me
on top
‘less you kiss me again.

Care, fully, understand
holding hands, outstretched
across your arms
demand, I love you
under any
circumstances, change
break
away to get
a new
day to
day, leave
but do not go.

Intentions in pictures are hung on the walls,
So the swimmers can swim and the dreamers can dream.
The sky is a grin worn by everpresent strife,
bread and butter to the wilderness, yet
Confined in a way that atmosphere
Is to the Earth, these friends are to friends.
The paws in diluvium follow trends
Fragrant of nostalgia for wilder springs,
So the walls are windows and the windows are wings.
The chimenea holds a flame like a sail
Tense against the force of their tales,
Pulling the house like a boat over a sea
So the words are serenity and the laughs are a breeze.
The television has replaced the mailbox
And there is no more word of the news
But often the birds do peck at their doors,
Doves come from over the storms, grey
And weathered, feathers tattered,
So the oceans are highways and the swells are their feet.

http://www.flickr.com/ace_0f_magic/

the hollowness of your hand
in mine
its grasp
strong and firm
soft and gentle
and we lost ourselves to comfort
only to come out from under
the wave of sympathy
to realize the essential emptiness of our embrace

I gave you something out of penance and remorse
for the one I had broken
and I found that I broke too in giving myself
over to you
and I feel lonelier than if we had
not embraced for that blunt moment on the stairs
for that scanty intrigue in the dark

necessity, bred from sorrow, from the deep caverns
of voiceless weeping
the shimmering sheen of pain
mine for him
yours for her
and we entangled in each other
aching for the solace of those
we could not touch
and for a brief moment we
forgot our pain

like the swings of childhood parks
we forgot the memory that this
summer only lasts for a brief time
and we swung into each other
abandoned thought
and lived in heated sheets
stolen kisses that lost themselves
outside this space

fleeting like the sigh of summer’s
rustling breeze cooling
the sweat from an impoverished heart
and we stood with our eyes closed
waiting for the heat to lift
waiting for the dawn to break

http://www.flickr.com/untitlism/

Caravan handshake – see you when this wind
has stolen our soil, and swept it to the rain:
then the concrete’s soliloquy will rub against
our gushing anecdotes, challenging our pain;
such tragedies are to be hoped for. The way
I was groping at the roots one would have thought,
dear child, you grew away in the passion
that I would follow, leaving behind pieces,
dropping your limbs, your ears, your heartaches,

my rush becoming a raccoon’s scurry in the back alley,
in mazes of malls and grocery stores, school halls,
sniffing sophisticated packaging, engraved casuistries,
brick walls graffitied over by rebels ashamed
of the critical bonds between furniture and children,
elegant, intelligent, not unlike the trade-offs,
the shrewd decisions that Nature seems to make.
Turn all this to artifact – the Mother of Life
all this

The nature of your love, O shadow that
precedes me on dark evens, blackening canvases,
inhaling the words from all pages in the shelves,
but never leaving me blind, for here is your sight,
here is your heart, there are some little words
I recall not for their meaning: rather they make
beautiful geometric art, and if even one falls out,
I would fall apart.

Arabesque, strewn my habits in the glades,
And I tremble to make a deliberate mistake.

http://www.flickr.com/beigephotos

The searching can only begin
when the light turns off.
It’s a quick chance to feel
what’s inside.

No colourful sounds,
No faces,
but beautiful things
in ugly places.

A change every instant,
a flickering,
a moment of silence
from aimless tinkering.

The light goes,
the wall of boundary fades,
and then arrives the fog and zap
of naked sight.

He tickles the wires
and slams against the walls.
He wants out,
the fly in the T.V.

But he’s addicted
to the strain of darkness
hollowing from within
the heart of the glow

What do they see in this emptiness?
The miraculous powers of human extension
or the loss of a fly,
who dies the quintessential death?

He buzzes about the box
exploring his final day
And finds the flashes and sounds
and merry go rounds urging him to stay

He won’t live long, the fly
In fact, he won’t live at all
For inside of this box
Life’s made to be null