The Outskirts of Balsam Street/Above Banpo Daegyo The Outskirts of Balsam Street Midnight, fireworks flare above the Fraser River as their sounds echo through Kerrisdale, and into my room. Midnight on the first day of January, starting in the late winter with branches of magnolia, I am left out by the Vancouver sky pouring foreign … Read more
Tree branch splinters mirror my frayed fingers skin peeling from the nail bed. I wonder when exactly it became so hard to shift my eyes away from this point on the ground. I used to feel the blood whisking through my veins, laced around and under and through my flesh. It’s stagnant now, though, and … Read more
I surrender to her a snake it wasn’t even the markings, nor the newfound jagged edges that decorated the pieces to my innocence, nor the green tint that replaced the blue within me. the oceans emptied and the grass grew greener. it was never the coils, the constricting and the hissing, the insatiability of a … Read more
This is not about the abuse my father smells of the forest— slight rot of tree root, streams as they melt over rock & limb. when I was little, I’d press my face into his work shirt, perch my feet on top of his. we’d waddle around the kitchen like that, a balance stable enough … Read more
Vibrancy In response to painting Yellow-Red-Blue by Wassily Kandinsky The doorway to our world shines brightly in the overhead lights. The shapes swirl in defiance, crisscrossing over one another, blending colors like wax melting in the sun, fused by helplessness– being dragged to our world that’s filled with rage, violence, and hatred. Their world is … Read more
Compact Soul, Hollow House To be a compact entity is to never exist. Never to touch the glistening baseboards, Or the still wet to the touch walls, Or even the cobwebs, Not even the spiders need to know of your existence. But you? Tiny tin soul, Tarnished with rust, Sharpened by quickly thrown quarrels, Why … Read more
simple A slow-burn, simplistic existence, unwavering in its unsteadiness. Sometimes, hours last minutes; and some minutes-hours. A book read by candlelight, a slow dance in the full-moon’s light. A red-eye flight, under star speckled night sky. A slow-burn, simplistic existence. Vinyl record on the turntable, the final minutes of a sunset, long Friday nights out, … Read more
The Poet To ease his ever restless nerves a neurotic writer sits at his notebook He looks to past works with dissatisfaction. a grip tightens on his chest while he looks for new ideas and new feelings, something to build on, some world to escape to. Thrashing a pen with intense strokes the poet seeks … Read more
The big city I went to New York a few weeks ago I didn’t have much fun there The buildings blocked the view of the sun No one cared to look at anyone else The people were all smoking the city itself exhaled cigarette fumes and spat up bile from its sewer grated lungs It … Read more
