Joanna Gilman Hyde

"Good Morning, World!"

AFTER RUDDER’S

Yarmouth, NS 8:30pm

I saw that institutional building

in the sunset haze

over Yarmouth Harbour

perhaps for the last time

— Oh how I can taste being entrenched there

“Patient X”

a basket case

“with delusional aspects”

Who wouldn’t eat

for years it seemed

yet turning out of Yarmouth

a pink ray fell upon My Page

SUPERSTORE PARKING LOT

Yarmouth, NS 6:10pm

My Daughter is beautiful

even in the ugliest of lights

buying Her Bedding for college

on the dirtiest of floors

— the concrete of Wall Mart —

having to use Her Own Debit Card

because Her Mother brought

a wallet-less purse

SECURITY

The Hawk Deck NOON

The harsh call of The Crow

interspersed with My Meandering Mind

alerts Me to what

I am thinking

as an accent mark

an exclamation point:

Yes — I am happy

here on My Deck

I am secure

— oh! another Crow —

I am secure here

but My Mind is connected

to a twenty-year-old

event

which has guided Me

to this place of solace

and guides Me still