Weeding papers, shedding years as
fable,
Years of numbers, dollars, gross and
net;
Riffling ordered files upon the table,
Measurements like music, of love,
regret.
Rain was seeping mist, my tea was cold,
A pinching darkness lay upon the room.
Feeling less than able, feeling, old.
Dieffenbachia and Spathiphyllum gloom.
Then, appeared the poet. Not in a
dream
Distant, yet so near, asking for a
light,
But on the cover of a McGill magazine,
Dapper, poised, looking at the camera's
sight.
How he came to be within “Utilities”
I don't know. But out he slipped fresh
as print.
Nineteen eighty-two, “Scrivener”
volume three,
Slightly yellowed, nick or two, not
quite mint.
Memories arose, cross-hatched with
thought,
Bookshops, cafés, parks and mountain
shade;
Mezzotint musings in nostalgia caught.
Halcyon days. Perhaps. The dues were
paid.
Purchased at The Word, the source, the
stream,
Captured by the poet's poker face.
Chosen over Pynchon, or a Henry Green,
Two bucks proffered for a soul of grace.
Twenty-four in nineteen eighty-two,
Blind, adrift, still plodding in the
maze,
(Rereading books like Soren's 'Point of
View.')
Did I see a way within his Zen-like
gaze?
Ladies' man at forty-seven, lover,
Troubadour poet, and singer of fame.
Thirty years have not quite seen
another
Suit and cowboy boot on la rue Saint-Urbain.
Forty-four years I lived in the city,
Happenstance never once crossed our
ways,
Sharing a bench, and views of women so pretty,
Sharing a bench, and views of women so pretty,
Feeding dry bread to the birds and the
strays.
Would it be too late if this native
returned
Recognitions faltering dense with time,
New steps, old paths to movements long
adjourned,
Papers in pockets, words, and numbers,
and rhyme?
ralph patrick mackay, april 30, 2012.
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