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
The Hawk Portico 6:40pm
The Jays Have The Propensity
To Call Me Away To My Childhood
Raised By A Single Mother
On Top Of A Hilly One Acre
In Woods Of Birdsong
& Blind Man’s Bluff
The Hawk Queen Bed 7:35am
I Hear The Surf Surge Through
My Open Black Window
& One Solitary Fog Horn Echoing
As If It Were Six
The Hawk Queen Bed 6:30pm
I Am A Baby
In A Bassinet On A Beach
How Many Of Us Have Been Born On The Surging Crest?
How Many Of Us Will Die Upon The Ebb?
I Am Rocked To Sleep
By The Rhythm
I Am Awakened
To My Infancy
The Hawk Portico 3:00pm
The Signalling Call Of The Gull
Is To Alert Others
But That I Too Hear It
Must Mean, Momentarily,
That I Am In An Exchange
Of
Ear
And
Voice
The Hawk Deck 12:30pm
I am out of the literal
& metaphoric bed
of My First 52 Years
I have been shedding My 145 pounds
& am down to a proper 136
with two cups of tea
& half a banana left by Eliza
I have suffered a 24-hour fatigue
& wondered if I was not eating enough —
So What Will Become of My
Shredded Manuscript?
(need I remind You, My Audience,
that 2 copies may, with the Luck of God,
still exist)
& if They do not?
I must accept Their Loss
& shed Them as well
The Tomato-coloured Couch 1:52pm
I Am The Silver Bullet
Circling This Globe
Spermatozoan
In My Femininity
The Tomato-coloured Couch 8:00pm
All Other Losses
Seem To Culminate
In The Loss Of A Pet:
down to The Fish Plant I went
in the blowing fog
to look for Cami
& saw nary a cat
only a nice man
who wondered what I wanted
“I’m looking for a lost cat”
“Oh, I’ve had about five people so far
this summer —
one fella even had a picture — ”
believe it or not
a helium balloon
flew
overhead
Joanna Gilman Hyde 