Stowel Lake

Stowel Lake 

Down a seam in a dusty track

cars lining the road above,

you wade in,

separate the lily pads with

your praying clasp,

emerald ripples  

bloat,

encase naked white skin 

over there,

thick atop a wooden dock, 

decorated by

dragonflys and voices weaving the

gloaming.

North of Secrets

There is just something over the top exciting about receiving a book in the mail that you created. For me this book, North of Secrets, represents so many things.

It's a representation of a decade worth of personal history. It's a record of some people who have been very important to me. It has some of my favorite photos. It outlines some of my thoughts related to therapy, of emotional struggles, healing and the ability to change.

It contains many poems that I wrote from the past when it seemed as if, as a result of depression and some very sad events, that I would not so much think in words or sentences but in poems that seemed to come to me as if given to me by someone else fully formed. They seemed to come so easily back then when most of them were written in the late 90s.

It contains 59 of my favorite photos from places I've been that have most significantly left their mark on me, for better or worse: The West End and Stanley Park. Saltspring. Abiquiu, New Mexico and Santa Fe. Salmon Arm. Chiapas, Mexico.

Yes, I admit it, these are not exactly international destinations of intrigue but places, in my small life, that are alive in my memories and in photos that capture my take on a time and place where very significant experiences happened for me.

I just can't say enough about how great it is that an idea/reality such as Blurb.com exists so that anyone who wants to has the ability to showcase their creativity. Why wait to be famous when the likelihood of that happening is less than winning a lottery?

There's more than enough room in the world for all representations of creativity, not just of the chosen few that are rather arbitrarily determined (by whom?) to be worthy of public recognition.

I don't believe anything has made me happier in the past year than the process involved in putting together this book and now being able to hold it in my hands knowing that I have created for myself, a bit of a legacy, one that I would have no other way to create since I have never had, nor ever will have, children. (But, in a way this is even better because, unlike offspring, I had full control of the outcome!)

I've chosen to keep this book private on the Blurb.com site because of the extremely personal nature of the contents and because some of the photos of people within it, but [if you are a personal friend of mine] and you would like a copy, I can order one for you. The cost is $25.00

It contains 44 pages of 17 poems and 59 photos (along with descriptions about how the poems came to be in terms of the person, place or thing that sparked their origin).

Here's a little teaser:

On the surface, this book may seem to be about some of my poetry and photos.

And, that it is!

But, those are the end products of a much more important journey that forced me inside to that placed located north of my own secrets.

We all know when we're keeping a secret. But, what of that place that's even deeper and full of secrets that we may not even know we have: the subconscious.

It wasn't a place I thought I'd ever be visiting. A melancholy place, always present, extremely bothersome, causing all sorts of chaos in my everyday existence until the emotions were unearthed and expressed...

Home is where the Heart is

The sun is streaming in the door this morning warming my back as I write this post.

I'm eating blackberries that I picked from out the front looking forward to today because I get to do two interviews for two features for an upcoming edition of Aqua magazine.

I'm going to interview a woman who has a huge Teddy Bear collection. That should be good for a hug or two (from the bears) :-) and then even more interesting to me, I get to meet a woman who started what was called the Vancouver Literary Storefront in the late 70s which could be likened to the precursor of the BC Federation of Writers.

She has run (with her husband) a small press called Mother Tongue Publishing that used to make beautiful, hand made chapbooks and now they are moving into trade publishing focusing on BC Art, BC Art History and Literature.

It should be really interesting to talk to her.

If you look closely at this photo, in the tree on the right hand side, it seems as if there is a little pink heart at the top of the tree caused by the reflection of the light. The heart looks like it has been placed there in the tree. I like that.

Saltspring has always captured my heart.

Waiting for Sleep

In the West End
stilletos running on cement
are all it can take
to crack my
dreams,
mistake
talking heads on TV
for lovers'
midnight scenes

backstage
the other side
of the wall.

A Harley's engine
first trumpet
keeps score

sirens

count raindrops
recite folklore

the clock radio grows
a neon mind of its own,
spoons with worry
packaged tightly
to fit inside quiet
at half past four.

Waiting for sleep

when you can't

freezes time.

Poetry in remission

Quite a long time ago now, I was on Hornby Island near Tribune Bay camping with my friend Neil. In honour of summer, I'll tell this story here.

It was late in the afternoon and he had gone up to the campsite. It was one of those types of campsites that I really despise and would never knowingly choose but there isn't much choice on Hornby. People have cottages. They rent cottages. The unwashed masses tent.

People were everywhere and the sites extremely close together with the arrangements practically replicating a high-density Mountain Equipment Co-op slum.

In an attempt to avoid that reality perhaps, I remained on the beach. It was hot and I was watching everyone: families, children, teenagers and it was as if I began to see the entire human life cycle unfolding before my eyes, but ghostly images,as if projected onto the real people.

As I was watching the families gather up their endless amounts of beach stuff-almost as if the seaweed had transformed into plastic and coolers and flippers and chairs on the one side of me - with the teenagers hovering around each other tentatively and nervously on the other, this poem came to me very quickly.

It wasn't exactly in this form but when I got home a few days later, I worked on it and I continued to change it until I got to something similar to this.

It's rare for me to write poetry these days which is too bad because I really like the process. But, it has been a very long time since I have been inspired enough, or depressed enough, or have felt so aware in the present moment to create something like this.

The whole process of writing a poem amazes me. An image sparks the desire to capture an emotion and from that the experience materializes into words that when combined form a new, separate, unique entity. Like giving birth. Voila!

The Sleepwalkers

After the float plane
circles and lands in Tribune Bay
to deposit the pilot on a sailboat,
and the comments about how the other half live, subside,
the sleepwalkers leave the beach,
forgetting to shirk their 9-5 routines.

Mothers hug wet children dry
dabbing at them with tender beach towel buffs.

Splashing shrieks of little boys
fade into their father's voices calling out to them.

Coolers click, open and shut.

Beach umbrellas collapse.

Deck chairs fold under arms.

Pink, plastic floating devices
complete this balancing act.

Silent parade of life
warning teenaged girls
with tulip-bud breasts
that time will overcome their prancing,
even though boys in boxer shorts
with wheat-bleached crew cuts
now follow them, silently,
Not actually having much fun,
except, in their fertile imaginations.

Stalking possibilities about what it really feels like inside.

Wondering how it will ever be possible
to cross the distance stretched between them now,
as if navigating these sandbars will lead them
to the warm entrance between thighs

the same way the ocean

fills the holes in the rocks

at high tide.