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In: SAPP Magazine, May 2024

 SAPP | a poetry zine – where modern meets grunge. (sappzine.ca) 

Driving home in the dark, 

cold rain tapping 

and splattering the windshield, 

I saw her again 

It was only the form of her -

body bent forward, 

pushing the cart 

an oversized coat swallowing her 

Still, I knew it was her 

from the shoes 

sodden, laces untied 

the sloppy step of them 

heavy and slow 

I slowed down, looked again, then again, 

the front wheel of my car 

sliding just so, 

over the yellow line 

The rest of the way home I thought, 

what are you doing here 

and not as in, you don’t belong here 

but more so, 

why 

Why do you have sodden shoes 

as heavy as bricks 

and a soaked coat that 

pulls you down further 

and why the pushing, pushing, 

always it seems, uphill 

As I pulled into the driveway of my warm home, 

the vision of you followed me inside 

and I wondered where you went 

with your cart, full to the point of tipping 

of long, wet, heavy sticks 

It's easy to jut up your chin and sneer,

it stinks here and it's easy to

shake your head as you walk by

though--

who are you mumbling to?

the leaning, thin

bent-at-the-waist teen,

whose mother looks like a ghost now;

her bony hand holding the phone

calling the Road to Recovery hotline,

leaving another message

each word a shrill begging,

that someone call back this time

or is it the well-spoken official

with the Brioni tie,

at his glossy Edelman desk

and perfectly smooth pen,

signing the death warrant

that makes you tsk-tsk/sick?

"When the long drought comes,..."

In Reckoning 2, Reckoning Press. 2017.

"He slurps his black coffee..."

Winner of Vancouver Island Regional Library Poetry in Your Pocket contest, Spring 2021.