A Poem for Angry Sunny-days

or Surprised by Folk Music and Grief

Warm days can feel sad.
Sunshine can shit on your soul,
birds sing sarcastic.

Familiar romantic problems drove me from my dark room. I ran angry. Under pedals and pollinators. Bright sun bounced off Burrard Inlet as kites were flown by packs of giggles. Spring flirted with t-shirt temperatures, and every house, apartment and condo in Vancouver emptied out into the parks and beaches. The city was a Chialis commercial. And I had the day off, but was spending it with melancholic folk music glaring at happiness. 

Grief takes sharp turns,

no sense of propriety.

holds heavy thoughts light.

Runs do their work. By the time my knee started complaining I was wearing a smirk. A toddler perched a-top a dad pointed at crows dropping mussels on the bike path. I stopped for a drink. Listening to folk singers groan farewells to lost loves, I surveyed the glad scene. I remembered taking my dad to see the Kingston Trio, his favorite folk band, by then playing with no original members. Best gift I ever gave him. My smirk turned to full smile. Sometimes I really wish my dad were still alive.

Simon at the Bar

As they were coming out, they found a man of Cyrene named Simon, whom they pressed into service to bear His cross.

I hope someone bought him a drink
if ever a man needed a double and some time
to let the pulse come-down and blood warm,
a breath and long moment to think. 

I hope people let him be,
to stew in the bigness. A change 
best viewed at the bottom of a tumbler;
meaning not understood but felt.

I hope he didn't rush to words,
left it in images, smells, and pains
still shooting from shoulder and neck--
undecorated, without ornament.

I hope someone bought him a drink
he let soak down to his toes
as flavors came out slow 
the questions took shape:

Cocaine and Writers Block

The barista is on cocaine

I’ve had writers block

for a year. Two maybe,

it’s been a while.

I don’t trust him, skin picked

and scabbed. Dishes whisked away

on jittery hands. He banters

with an aussie co-worker;  

sure in the moment—I envy him.