She sits with her white sorrow. Her grief multiple streamers. How many Januarys ago did her daughter with the corkscrew curls come home for lunch (grilled cheese, tomato soup)? How loud was the one-two of brake-crash, even heard by her teacher a block away? A grieving mother still looks like this--- mad as mother steroids at all the uncurious folk, cruising by the crucified daisies, eye-level, on battered phone pole. Tomorrow, she will bring more--- wield staple gun like assault rifle, surrender more submissive stems and petals to gods who believe in damnation for those who forget about angels, still tumbling in magnified memory in the snow.

Nine forty one. The gymnasium. Grade Fives. Floor hockey. Another fine day in the agora. Till one bruised loser plus two hurled sticks equals one Superman net ricocheting off gymnasium floor, today's concrete trampoline. Hastiest exit ever. No hope for bounce back. No hope for the republic's return to an otherwise noteworthy performance. Boys and girls, this is not an evacuation. Not sure what we're allowed to call it, but our principal calls it a return to the nest. According to her, there's rightness in the number of times we say it. So fly, little birdies, fly, and don't let the door hit you! For that, we're also responsible. Ten fifty two. Kindergarten room. What might the price be for one Pokemon card, confiscated? Give unto me a bucket of classroom Lego, dumped, a heavy downpour of primary colours and I'll present to you a little man's standing O, thunderous, Thor-like, and for his encore, a deliberate tearing of the cover of Where The Wild Things Are. Boys and girls, the nest is kindling to the point of no returm. Pivot, we must pivot! Can you repeat after me, pivot! Pivot! It means turn, turn on ball of foot, then lead in opposite direction. Turn, I said! Two oh three. Afternoon recess. A hit list, he wrote, dagger points on those who made basketball ahead of him. The chosen ones, the cougar pursued, on playground, a grassland for predator and prey. Did the duty teacher dream from victim's scalp, the handfuls of hair, the crossword of scratches on a forearm, the hungry paws encircling a neck? For the rest of the school, a Code Nest? And what about the angry birds who stayed to fight? For their friends. For his demons, we are supposed to be sorry. In silence, of course. Boys and girls, forget what I told you about pivot. Too controlled for the words I really want to say. Too gritty real for the fantasy of flight. Should I plunk down an essay, a doctrine of thought, a poem? As long as I don't call each daily infero an evacuation.

Holy the stirrups holy the raised knees holy the cervix holy the spread holy that hole according to need. Holy the resilience to bare bear the poke, the prod. Holy the cave, holy the walls contracting,collapsing. Holy the breathing the in, the out. Holy the force- the push or the pull. Holy the gush. Holy the labourers- holy the compassion in that antiseptic room holy the hand squeezed purple holy the whisper- you did great! Holy the relief. Holy a life begotten.

(In Memory of the Afzaal Family in London, Ontario) When we contemplate the felling of rainbows how they balloon above boulevards collapse in tragic layers we fade to Kristellnacht by the traffic lights a cut scene where colourful victims bleed out thin bands of mayday from their broken window spirits and we remember how we thought we all bled. We forget about the ghouls that shrink while others levitate wearing cloaks that aren't even a real colour.

Skip the denial, dive blood first into anger. Fact is, you can call red oxblood crimson scarlet or candy red like her cardigan & lipstick, her nose ring, a stud bolder than mine. Cinnamon wisdom, sweet & sharp, Yet mischievious with her conspiratorial half-whisper- I'm not vaccinated, you know, and you giggle back, regret later... Words futile as final wills and testaments, swallowed like plastic down uncomfortable throats Your words. Hers. You remember them peaceful. Rose-coloured.

Let us skin those spuds naked till they look like us: heavy moons undressed, whole halved quartered. Let us dream about being grated to barest bits, how we can get raw, ballsy even with those slippery shavings, sliding in the wiggly salted pork, tasty on the tongue! We can light fires under tin pot oceans, our little worlds boiling foam around their curves. We are a plateful of universes, our rounded bellies swollen enough to touch again, again skin on skin.

the morning after dad died two snow tread hearts in front of our house bold in their space taking from delivery truck's tired grooves, perfect three point turn graceful execution twin arches heaving sympathy and joy. flinging fast stubborn November snow appearing the previous night fresh, settled. No longer sifting through black clouding our dusk. Dual heart tips point at me moving me forward two exact compasses.

These shafts dead piled behind glass straight, wavy blackish, brownish wheat coloured scarecrow braid This silky earth sticks to surface of ballooning outrage shuttered recollections of follicles, the ones scissored from becoming.

Only mystics see her that restless virgin turned airborne goddess. In that horizontal hover flinging seeds of rebellious colour, she is ground zero mad rooting in favour of viridescent fields and blue hope skies. Her delicate defiance too buries the dead. Places them under stalks she planted for more than just tiny glories and a splash of sunshine. Like any mother cradles her remains, she picks from her flower's black rounds fresh seeds. Buries them as she howls.

Walk. Walk without socks, convince unbelievers that blisters are stigmatas. Walk towards the chaos of the trees, derail the trainwreck thoughts, explode their carefully laid tracks. Walk and let your eyes also travel in technicolour, imagine the path as brick with everything else aglow. Walk till you notice the rabbit, statuesque, frozen in camouflage brown. Confront the white witch who bullies you too. Imagine her scrawny neck, squeeze it, delight in the softness you didn't know she had. Find the spot where the gagging begins. And ends. Stretch. Your legs, back, hamstrings, calves, your fossilized hips, your vagus nerve. They too are part of the resistance.