The Hawk Outpost 8:40am
The Brilliant Sheen
Upon The Water
Fills My Heart & Eyes
I Love It So
It Guides My Way
I Will Sing Of It
Until I Die
The Tomato-coloured Couch 6:38pm
There once was A Girl
for Whom all She touched
turned to Silver
She lived in a Silver House
with Her Mother
and Five Cats
(The Cats weren’t Silver)
— there was a Silver Statue
of Her Mother after The Mother
died
& The Girl kept It
under Her Silver Bed
She had Friends come over
but would not touch Them
unless They wanted to be Silver too
One Day She met A Little Man
down a mossy lane
and The Little Man touched Her
by mistakei
He instantly turned
to Silver
and ran away
without even telling The Girl
His Name
The Hawk Western Hallway 7:25pm
The Sun behind The Fog
is a gleaming disc of Gold
Clouds of Sea Mist
blow across
yet The Sun filters through
& tells Me
broadly
that My Shower Of Silver Lights
is My Ticket
The Tomato-coloured Couch 6:22pm
My House is Asylum
My Hands offer Asylum
when placed upon
any body in pain
in fear
In My House, with My Hands
I can cast out
suffering
I can deliver
My Power
into The Hands
of Another
I have The Power
to Heal
I can Heal
My Friends
I can Heal My
Husbands
My Lovers
through
My Dead Brother
& The Deaths of
My Parents
I am Emboldened
I can Heal
This World
through My Art
& My Mind
I can Instruct
Nourish
Tone Down
Play Up
Send Every Body
Home
The Hawk Portico 5:15pm
I absorb surf
sounding off
from The Cape
I catch
swells of waves
rushing inshore
filtering through
scrub spruce
across open yards
streaming into My Limbs
to meet My Body’s Core
The Hawk Deck 11:36am
I am drinking in
The Autumn
when I drink My Tea
I am taking in
the lower sun
the preparations
of neighbours’ lawns
the last mowings
the wood split
for winter
The Hawk Outpost 9:17am
Silver Light envelopes Me
as I stand before
My Hawk Outpost —
I see The Beads Of Light
on The Laundry Line
& feel the warmth of Sun
shimmering
through My cobwebbed
window
Barrington Passage 1:16pm
I’ve walked across
My First Fall Leaves
upside down, the leaves
not Me
Oh — not Me — I have
all the tools at My Reach
for The Greatest, Grandest
entry of All —
I have The Seasons
set before Me:
beginning with Autumn
when I laid out My Canvas
on Michael Jackson’s birthday
when I signed My Name on October 10th
when I moved to Nova Scotia
and had My 2.4 Children —
Oh I was happy
until My Mother Died
but then, even then
I had the shock of newness
in The Shower Of Lights
to ponder, to confound everyone
around Me
to culminate in October
the month of My Baby Girl
to release My Self
inside the reassuring caress
of The Littlest Man
to Whom I have linked My Self
in My Mind
for every last season of Fall
The Hawk Portico 5:47pm
I wonder what happened
to The Clothes I left in Atlantic
when I left My Husband
for Dr Blair —
how long did They stay
in the closet Peter built
— My Shoes —
— I can’t remember
what shoes —
did He take Them
to The Salvation Army?
— but Here —
here on The Hawk
where silence greets Me
from My Red Deck Chair
where I can hear a bird fly
or a neighbour’s flag flap
and the surf, always the surf
— Here I needn’t ask —
The Hawk Deck 2:50pm
I am grown up now
the squawk of the Jay cannot lure
Me back —
when I speak in childish tones
it is to emphasize My Desire —
My Vision Of Black —
I Am A Figure Of Wonderment
& The World
must always
wonder
Joanna Gilman Hyde 