folio : Forty-five Ottawa poets
after Vintage Story
for Michael Ondaatje
My fears came to pass
and passed. I had my
migraine,
weed
anxiety, acute reminder
I am not the badass I
think I am.
It
makes a nest in my stomach.
A gurgle hidden in
diverticules.
But I have not died. I obeyed the ancient law,
In time each hippocampus
must be brought to heel;
I
went into the cellar, a brave boy,
and
slayed the shiver which had spawned there.
I call the cats. My hands
dripping with offal.
Collecting bits from the
edge of the cleaver,
thick with it. I count
them as they come lick
the kill from my fingers.
On average, we lose
a kitten a litter; one
gate left ajar, and a
lion in him roars, an
irresistable call.
I know you can’t save
them all.
In January amidst the
longest night we entered
the iron age, pulled a
molten and ductile ingot
from the bloomery and
bent it into pickaxes
as
though blowing glass. Deluded, I’d guess,
on the promise of
success, on being tugged
by the reins of industry,
on
burgeoning.
We cackled, “Down with
the Empire!”, dancing
drunk on goji berry wine, cave paintings animate
‘round the firepit on the
roof. You stumbled
and I was struck sick with a vision of the
future --
the sharp corner of the
smoking rack.
It was like they told me
it would go.
I opened my mouth
and my dad’s voice came
out.
Liam Burke: I am searching for a home for a manuscript of poems that use the imagery and terminology of dungeon crawling RPGs as a metaphor for mental illness. (If this is something you're interested in acquiring, reach out!) Meanwhile, I am working with Manahil Bandukwala on a full-length sequel to our chapbook Orbital Cultivation (collusion books, 2021).
