When Life is Too Much - Aug 5 2025

 

When Life is Too Much

Aug 5 2025

After words had been said

the bereaved embraced

and the mourners departed

after the tears had been spent

soil shovelled

and the diggers left,

there was an emptiness

the sound of my breathing couldn’t fill

but still

the sense of peace was uncanny,

a feeling I never expected

in this place of sadness and loss.

Where the infants are buried

is especially so,

a secluded patch

toward the back

behind a low cast iron fence,

small markers 

carved with cherubs and hearts

that seem too close to be right.

But still, the serenity;

an oasis of green

in the city’s grinding rush,

a welcome retreat 

when life gets to be

too fast and too much

its carpet of green

smelling of freshly cut grass,

and its over-arching trees

standing like sentinels

that have been there forever

keeping watch

its mismatched markers

and marble monuments,

epitaphs

as idiosyncratic

as the souls they commemorate

and the early ones

that over time have settled,

leaning

like old men

with bad legs

not ready to give up.

How the sound of dirt

falling on wood

has a firm dull thump

of finality.

While the last clump

earth-to-earth

is quiet as the grave.

how the dark oblong patch

carved out of fresh green grass

looks raw;

and even though

it will soon enough grow over

is as good a metaphor for absence

as any unanswered prayer

and how marble weathers 

and even granite doesn’t last.

A sober reminder

for when life is too much

that this, too, shall pass.

Eyes on the Street - Aug 2 2025

 

Eyes on the Street

Aug 2 2025

They’re letter carriers here, not mailmen.

Genderless, sure

but also kind of mechanical;

more conveyance 

than flesh and blood.

Bills in brown envelopes

with see-through windows,

magazines

on glossy paper,

birthday cards

and letters from camp.

Junk mail

straight to trash.

Not that we knew our mailman

by name

(who, back then, was invariably male).

Our family was too reserved

and he was in a hurry.

But something about his regularity

was reassuring;

the dog barking,

the sound of footsteps

clomping briskly to the door,

the mail 

advancing through the slot

and dropping to the floor,

the metallic report

as its lid clanged shut.

Every weekday

like clockwork.

Back when there were eyes on the street

as Jane Jacobs preached.

When it seemed a man in uniform

who looked official enough

and projected authority

was someone you could count on.

Now, we don’t get many letters

send even fewer

and the carrier rarely stops.

Because these days

we’re too impatient for postal mail,

not to mention the cost of stamps.

And, of course, the environment;

virtue

by means of the internet.

Too bad 

when the world changes too fast

to keep up.

When our leaders are erratic,

bad triumphs over good,

and it feels like things only get worse. 

When we could use some regularity

and reassurance,

even as mundane and diurnal

as a civil servant

and letters on the floor.

The dog is long gone,

the mailman’s moved on,

and someone else lives in our house

if it’s even still there.

I imagine the letter carrier’s next;

replaced 

by an actual machine

trundling down the street

on polyurethane wheels,

beeping annoyingly

like a truck in reverse.

The actual quote is “eyes belonging to those we might call the natural proprietors of the street”, from the influential urbanist Jane Jacobs’ signature book The Death and Life of Great American Cities. 

(Who, by the way, ultimately chose my home town, Toronto, to live:  a point of pride we still smugly enjoy. Although that was Toronto back before it became unmanageably big. And “home town” sounds too quaint for a big city. On the other hand, it was (and I suppose still is) a city of neighbourhoods, and I was not (and am not!) the big-city type: I grew up in the suburbs in a place called Willowdale. Which I think sounds homey enough!)

Pruning - Aug 1 2025

 

Pruning

Aug 1 2025

I prune the trees.

Dead branches break off

living ones are severed.

The tangle thins,

light gets in.

I am reverential toward trees.

So used to let them have their way.

As if, unlike poetry

more is better;

more foliage, more shade, more life.

Now, the cuts still hurt,

but I understand

the greater good.

There is a difference

between paring and purging,

conscientious thinning

and razing to the ground.

I think of the clearcut; 

the tangle 

of scarified wood, 

deep furrows

of rain scoured earth,

and dead trees 

littering the ground

like pick-up sticks;

either rejected

or incidentally cut

and left to rot.

But also the green shoots breaking through,

new growth

that would eventually carpet the land.

Creative destruction

an economist would say;

the sort of man

who knows the price of everything

and the value of nothing. 

The trees are signalling distress,

working together

through chemistry 

against a common enemy

   . . . who, pruning shears in hand

is me.

Of course, trees are not sentient,

don’t retrospect

or nurse old grudges;

they're simply defending themselves

as nature intended.

I think of fresh-cut grass,

a smell I still love

despite knowing

it’s the smell of alarm.

Think of the needles 

an idle hand

strips from a low-lying branch

of balsam fir.

The scent of spice and earth

lingering on my skin.

Think of the pheromones 

of pine and spruce

that somehow brighten my mood

as I walk through the woods;

the boreal alchemy

of healthy trees.

And downwind of fire 

the acrid smoke and poisonous air.

The pall 

that turns the moon red,

and overhead

places an alien sun

in a hazy sky

that feels vaguely threatening. 

Perhaps a portent

of worse to come.

One of many trenchant witticisms borrowed from Oscar Wilde: A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing from his play Lady Windermere’s Fan.

To elaborate on fresh-cut grass (according to my A.I. app, Perplexity): 

"The smell of freshly cut grass is caused by compounds known as green leaf volatiles (GLVs), such as cis-3-hexenal, which are released when grass is damaged by cutting. For the grass, these chemicals act as a distress signal: they warn other plants of danger and can even attract predators to fend off the insects eating the grass."

Scribblings - July 31 2025

 

Scribblings

July 31 2025

A day, like any other.

Forgettable

even as it’s lived.

So if memory makes us who we are

I am arrested,

inhabiting a past

that’s increasingly distant

and incrementally lost.

I envy those

who have memorable lives.

Who are consequential

and will be remembered

at least for a time.

Envy and regret,

two emotions

I’m reluctant to own;

only bitterness would be worse.

But retrospection

is also a teacher,

and envy, instead of sour

can be aspirational.

   . . . Or so one hopes.

Will this poem be the one thing

that makes me remember today;

my unsettled state 

of discontent,

this enervating sense of futility?

Or is it, too, forgettable?

That is, in the unlikely event it gets read.

So here I sit

like every day

living in my head;

a scribbler

assembling words

and churning out verse

the world happily ignores,

a solipsist 

who talks to himself

and compulsively takes notes,

as if keeping track

was actually of interest.

I’m an ouroboros eating its tail;

as if you could feed on yourself

and flourish.

And if not sitting,

then the bystander

who wandered past

and simply went on by.

A Sudden Stillness - July 26 2025

 

A Sudden Stillness

July 26 2025

I draw a line in the sand.

Step back, and draw another.

Walk on it barefoot,

and the silky heat

of sun-warmed sand between my toes

is pure delight.

But then, those broken shells

like landmines, 

pesky sandflies,

the tide coming in.

I’ve never been buried to the neck

  — a disembodied head

sand, caked in its hair,

swivelling stiffly

as it anxiously looks out —

but have known helplessness,

felt immobilized

by fear.

But what I fear most

are the sands of time

counting down.

I picture an hourglass emptying out,

tiny granules

of light brown sand

pouring steadily down,

like some free-flowing liquid

tinged with gold.

How it funnels through the crimped waist

of its clear glass vessel

faster and faster

the less there is,

as if impatient 

to empty out.

And as the column spirals down,

how the centre

forms a small depression

until the bottom falls out;

a sudden stillness

that leaves me feeling there should be something next.

Can the end of time

really be so banal?

If only I could flip the glass

bottom-to-top

and start again,

counting the hours from scratch. 

Not reincarnation, exactly,

but at least a second chance.

Like digging free,

a step in retreat,

commanding the tide to recede.

But even Canute 

with all the hubris of a king

could not restrain the tide,

rising up

to scour the beach

and wash the sand clean.

Grass Grows - July 24 2025

 

Grass Grows

July 24 2025

Grass grows in the cracks.

A great poet once wrote

that the crack is how the light gets in;

as if imperfection

is what illuminates

and enlightens us.

But I also find in this 

a lesson in resiliency.

How things find a way.

How cut, grass grows back

time and again,

walked upon

springs up

leaving no trace.  

How it weathers hard winters

and the lure of false springs,

sheltering

in its subterranean lair;

and how it browns in drought-stricken summers,

but when rain finally comes

seems to green-up

overnight. 

It won't remain a perfect lawn

you could putt a golfball on. 

And despite a good day’s work

imposing order

on a disorderly world,

the cracks in the walkway 

won't be manicured long.

Soon enough, grass pokes up

in odd lengths

uneven clumps, 

because in all its imperfection 

life finds a way. 

There will always be cracks

that can't be filled,

spaces

that can't be bridged. 

And plants

compelled to seek out the sun 

competing for life-giving light.

Perhaps we can learn from Kintsugi, the Japanese art;

where the cracks 

are what really matter

what draw the eye;

reminders

that the broken can be repaired,

that there is beauty

in imperfection. 

The cracks in things;

where grass will out

no matter what.

From Leonard Cohen’s Anthem:   “… There is a crack, a crack in everything / that’s how the light gets in.”

The definition of “weed” is purely subjective:  really anything, as long as you find it undesirable! Weeds are opportunists: any empty space, and they avidly fill it. So while we cultivate grass, it’s only desirable if it’s in the right place. Out of place, and it becomes as much a weed as dandelions and thistles.

Black Box - July 21 2025

 

Black Box

July 21 2025



In some large windowless building

in the outskirts, where no one goes,

row upon row

of blinking machines

whirrr with electricity,

computing zeros and ones

or making up their own

quantum reality.

This is the cloud

we so blithely speak of;

not a cirrus wisp

against a bright blue sky,

but hardware and chips

and the loud hum of power.

A forbidding place

where all our virtual selves

unwittingly reside.

When I was a child

clouds were the bailiwick of gods;

where the Almighty sat

gazing down

keeping track of our transgressions.

An ineffable God

made of insubstantial stuff;

the ethereal presence

you’d expect of a deity

whose name we were commanded

to never say out loud.

Now here is a cloud

that serves a higher purpose,

a seat

worthy of its occupant.

Or at least would be

if I were still a believer,

or frankly

ever truly was.

Still, there are clouds overhead

shape-shifting as ever.

How water

as vapour

takes every size and shape,

just as frozen

is never the same;

snowflakes

with more permutations

than atoms in the universe.

How even water in its liquid state

is mutable,

taking the shape of its container

no matter what.

And now, earthbound clouds

that do all look the same.

Windowless fortresses

with reinforced floors

where imposing machines

lining spotless corridors

run themselves.

Where, except for some guards

and a bored technician

humans are barred from entry.

Autonomous machines,

whose inner workings

are a black box

no one can see into.

Not a heavenly cloud

floating on air,

but glass and steel

on a concrete foundation.

Our god of ego, and instant gratification,

housed in a soulless building

you’d never notice

in the unlikely chance

you happened by.

A cloud we take for granted

as we scroll and tap away.

Believe in, sight unseen,

perhaps will soon obey.

I wanted to harp more on the vast electrical demand and greenhouse gas burden of the so-called cloud, but only got at that by implication in a couple of lines: the whirrr of electricity and oud hum of power. Instead, I somehow got diverted into a cautionary tale about the potential dangers of Artificial Intelligence. Hence the title.

Ironically, though (hypocritically?!!), I used my own A.I. (a handy app called “Perplexity”) to come up with this, which you’ll recognize from the poem:

The number of possible permutations of snowflakes is astronomical, far exceeding the number of atoms in the universe. For complex, six-fold radial snowflakes, estimates use combinatorial arguments: if a snowflake has 100 distinguishable features, the number of ways to arrange these is at least 100! (factorial) possibilities, which is greater than 10 to the 158th . For comparison, the estimated number of atoms in the observable universe is about 10 to the 80th.

All The Way Down - July 20 2025

 

All The Way Down

July 20 2025

Am I just imagining

that the land under my feet

is solid ground?

At least something to count on

in a wildly gyrating world.

Or is even that not fixed?

Because I’m told that space is expanding

and time relative;

and what else is there

aside from the 4 dimensions

we know of and can measure?

From my perspective, it’s contraction

all the way down.

I go out less,

my social circle shrinks,

and my horizon closes in

on this house

this room

this chair.

And not only does time go faster

the older I get,

but less and less remains.

So is regression next?

The second childhood

of creeping dementia

increasing dependence

wetting the bed?

And then will I shrink

into a toddler

fetus

hardened homunculus,

until my time comes to an end

and I don’t even take up space?

It’s the 20th,

and I have no idea

where July went.

Once, summer was forever

  —  so long, we got bored,

my friends and I

sitting on the curb

idly tossing stones  —

but now, the days get shorter

as if all summer wanted

was getting it over with.

Like an old movie,

where clock hands circle dizzily

and calendar pages flip.

I can see the camera zeroing in,

a close-up so tight

I see myself dissolve

into a blur of ghostly light.

Sigh. Another melancholic poem about ageing and the passage of time.

So really, one more poem about death, at least tangentially. Please accept apologies for my persistently morbid turn of mind!