It felt so real. The rain, the leaves, the lovemaking (but was there any passion, or was it just perfunctory. I did not feel any pleasure. It felt like I was twenty-two again. Living amongst xenophobic South Africans, and Johannesburg people, I sensed winter coming on acutely).
And then there was the kiss. Something inside of me died (well I always felt a succession of deaths after writing, and I went cold). Yet there was something there that was still absent. I woke up then. How could I put it into the words? There are no consequences on the astral plane. You lose everything if you think of desire as being simplistic. Oh no, it is much, much more complicated than that. So complex that scientists in North America are studying it. My dreaming of late left me depressive. The illness was returning. There were signs. A homosexual man with beautiful eyes, and sensitive hands passed me on the street. I wanted to find that confidence that I saw in his swagger on the page. I thought if I could do that it would explain everything, especially what I had been dreaming about. I needed to know why romance to me was like a lighthouse. I was always swimming away from it, backing away, getting shipwrecked. Left wondering why I was never anchored?
that rises great heights, separating pockets of sky
– some blue, some with clouds –
layers, textures swaying in gentle phrases,
opening the hilltop-cap of grief
more like pouring in
the truth of helplessness,
setting free depths unspoken,
domed in such beauty.
Perfection that cannot be matched
or misplaced as mediocre or somewhat flawed,
but is flawed, not one straight line
or obedience to symmetry,
all space taken up with its fecund flesh.
No cell or stem rotted without reason, rotted
because of regret or the weight of culture
or the ridged mind-set of past tradition, but all the past
contained within it.
The ancient trunk expanded equally in the roots
and the leaf currents, intertwined with other currents
to build a blanket, thick enough to feel protected,
mesmerized by the soft motion overgrowth bloom,
a place to anchor a home, release all weapons, comforted.
Dream
I dreamt again
of the past encroaching
like a wet towel, tight
around my clothed body.
I dreamt I felt alone, doomed to dance
on a suspended scaffold’s floor.
Among the bitter people I walked,
near their self-pity and inconsolable isolation.
I tried to separate myself, split the heavy air
with my fingers. I tried
to wave their fear into the mouth
of everlasting light.
But love was bitten at the stem,
and the hideous thirst within
grew again like a snake its second, tougher skin.
I dreamt I wandered half-made buildings,
where squatters lived, sheltered
in the dank concrete ruins.
I travelled through without shoes, dreaming
of sand-soft ground.
After the Day
Love is in my belly like evening tea,
comforting after the day’s rush.
Love is there like a discipline
I used to own, exciting
because of its blind determination.
The old man walks the alleyway
with his cane and curious eyes.
He waves to me from the window, then
stretches him arms to cup the wind.
Somewhere the stray has been saved
from the freezing-frost. Somewhere
a woman has conceived, and a dog
has found his favourite toy.
Love is a monk’s old robe
tainted a rich bluish green.
Like twilight blankets the day
it sits on my lap covering –
cherished, unclaimed.
We Rode
We rode our wounded dream
to a place drawn out like Prairie
ground. A washcloth was all we needed,
a scared rock or stepping stone.
Lingering there with useless hands,
many times ready for the culling field,
holding elephant bones under
condemning light.
We swept the dead-end from our horizon.
We lived looking within, seeking out some mercy
behind our bondage.
This land knew our pacing,
our ineffectual pilgrimage.
It was fire and still burns like war or
a fallen constellation.
We spun our wishes in mid-air,
tilled the lifeless soil
mourning the hot metal
that poured between good fortune
and the bloodstains of destiny.
Allison Grayhurst is a member of the League of Canadian Poets. Four of her poems were nominated for “Best of the Net” in 2015/2018, and one eight-part story-poem was nominated for “Best of the Net” in 2017. She has over 1200 poems published in more than 475 international journals and anthologies. In 2018, her book Sight at Zero, was listed #34 on CBC’s “Your Ultimate Canadian Poetry List”.
Her book Somewhere Falling was published by Beach Holme Publishers, a Porcepic Book, in Vancouver in 1995. Since then she has published sixteen other books of poetry and six collections with Edge Unlimited Publishing. Prior to the publication of Somewhere Falling she had a poetry book published, Common Dream, and four chapbooks published by The Plowman. Her poetry chapbook The River is Blind was published by Ottawa publisher above/ground press December 2012. In 2014 her chapbook Surrogate Dharma was published by Kind of a Hurricane Press, Barometric Pressures Author Series. In 2015, her book No Raft – No Ocean was published by Scars Publications. More recently, her book Make the Wind was published in 2016 by Scars Publications. As well, her book Trial and Witness – selected poems, was published in 2016 by Creative Talents Unleashed (CTU Publishing Group). She is a vegan. She lives in Toronto with her family. She also sculpts, working with clay; www.allisongrayhurst.com
Collaborating with Allison Grayhurst on the lyrics, Vancouver-based singer/songwriter/musician Diane Barbarash has transformed eight of Allison Grayhurst’s poems into songs, creating a full album. “River – Songs from the poetry of Allison Grayhurst” released October 2017.
C.S. Lewis reminds us
that some things
are always good:
a waterfall, a rainbow,
two hands clasped.
Take that away,
and you may never know
that anything can be good,
is always good, no matter
how you look and see.
J.J. Campbell (1976 – ?) is old enough to know better. He’s been widely published over the years, most recently in The Dope Fiend Daily, Horror Sleaze Trash, Dodging The Rain, Fourth & Sycamore and Under the Bleachers. His most recent chapbook, the taste of blood on christmas morning, was published by Analog Submission Press. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (http://evildelights.blogspot.com)
A strong wind was blowing, meaning a storm was coming, only it wasn’t outside… something wicked was brewing inside Silas Jones, the young man with the old man’s name, facing down the gun barrel of aging. Lightning crashed into his eardrums as SHE brushed up, ever so slightly against him with a semblance of thunder rumbling in the cavity where he thought his heart had gone missing.
Was this just going to be another missed opportunity, he would allow to slip through his aching fingers or just another cruel joke by the universe rendering his existence the ultimate punchline?
Her tigress eyes were golden flecked burning brightly, the curl of her lips with a malicious or inviting smile (it was hard to tell these days- dazed).
“Sy, how about a couple of rails in stock-room nine and you eat my pussy out like a mad man?”
Followed by the barely audible giggle through the nose and slight presence of hips against pelvis.
She smelled like peaches packed tightly in imitation Chinese manufactured velvet or was it, wet rodent bound with dead butterflies (butterflies feast on corpses)?
He turned around, tinnitus like broken cathedral bells in his left ear in almost utter disbelief but an aside glance delivered by Nancy (being the” SHE” in question) veering on bashful with sinful eyes of malice said otherwise. This was not like when the old lady had asked “Could you, blow me where the hampers are?”
THIS WAS REAL. This could be his feast. His shot at the very least of a sliver at a chance of redemption. An unwholesome deed without consequence.
Then came the squeak, the scuffs and the clicking of sneakers as if they were combat boots. Aqua shoes to be exact, yellow fake space-age soled with purple laces. The enemy with black framed glasses and weasel eyes had arrived.
“Sup, girl, thinking of buying this dress for youngest girl’s first communion.”
