Poems from
Fenwick Tower
NATHANIEL S. ROUNDS
Fowlpox Press
©MMXI Nathaniel S. Rounds
All Rights Reserved
ISBN: 978-0-9877346-9-3
Contents!?
Your guess is as good as mine.
I’ll check around the shelves of Don 88 Asian Grocery and see what I can find.
I might just pace the floor and wait for some new product to change my world—sit
outside the door there in an aluminum navy chair and write letters to Jack the Crow
from the stuffed specimen box in the Thomas McCulloch Museum. Play some skiffle
music with a blues harp and a foot pedal trash can. You can’t top up the contents list overnight.
Upon completion, the writer doesn’t really want to look it over. The writer is off finding
new things.
Song of the Marginal Man
1.
I have a friend at court
He defends my
Periodic narcosis
Gutter ball marginalia
Sublet parasitism
Doloroso hymns
Bleated long
And low
2.
I feel oblivious
To the cacophony of
The common crowd
The cold-hearted
Prosecution
Instead
I follow the wings
Of the honey guide
3.
The song of hands
Striking ewer and basin
They
Dance for the morning sun
Plaster ceiling is a silver screen
For sun’s bath laughter
Guest soaks in the meaning
Before undressing
Marvellous Travels by Land and Air*
Chainlink Drive is nailed to Lacewood Drive
Lacewood turns into Captain Danjou’s wooden hand
We fight valiantly to catch up to
Doctor Thirsky and his enormous flying kite
We lose him as he flies above
A family restaurant
And two urbanized seagulls
Thirsky in silhouette against the cloud-veiled sun
Looks like Baron Karl Münchhausen
He pierces a cloud and makes it weep
We pull over until such sadness dissipates
And science can prevail once more over
Poetic justice
*Written for Doctor Robert Brent Thirsk, “the first Canadian astronaut to fly a long duration expedition aboard the International Space Station”. I sent it to him the day it was finished. He responded with an autographed photograph. “Thirsky” was an affectionate bit of word play, which apparently he took in stride.
Laughing Laplander Blues
Electric power
Who needs it
We can watch the sun rise
Watch it do a fan dance with skimpy little clouds
Watch the sun do a belly flop
Plop over earth’s edge
Heat is marginally necessary
Drag some deeply scarred trees from the forest
Cut them up and make a fire inside
A stove discovered in the attic
Maybe we should just live up there
Leave the first two floors to the animal kingdom
Keep the goats and feral dogs full of venture capitalists
We can tie them together to make a motley sled team
Drag the house to town
Show the other rats
Where the real cheese is at
Mourners (1998, 2011, Halifax)
1.
Hyeah, and when we as lost sheep
Trudged through the snow
Accompanied by mourners
To the Irving Big Stop
You watched swarthy truckers
Eat their bulk in breakfast
Served in the evening.
Soon thereafter, we mulled over
Cabbages in net bags
And bought them—five for a loonie1—
And talked of cabbage stew while
Attendants pumped gas.
Snow falls on both the fat and needy/
Holds promise for those still alive enough
To dream.
2.
They built that bridge
To carry us from blighted fields
To Halifax and Promise.
To help feed Tracy and the little ones.
Social services would pay the toll,
If we let them, then roll back the red
Carpet and ask for money based on
Suspected earnings.
And before the bridge,
When there was a ferry,
I’d stuff some cognac and a sweater
Into a kit bag smelling of damp gone bad
And walk out onto the boat while dodging truck loads
Of potatoes. There was no wife then, and the loneliness
Was at par with tonight’s want.
A promise:
We shall cross this bridge together
Over the frozen Atlantic in Son Ed’s taxi
And return to that strange, red mud,
Suitcases full of treasures for our new home.
Later On, At the House Party
Older brother and the black sheep
Of our clan
(A study in spiritual insolvency)
Join me in voicing confessions
Into a Norelco reel-to-reel
Behind the family store.
One electric lead
One snare
One bass
Three voices
Improvise while father
Closes cash.
We will listen and smile
Some twenty years from now
When the black sheep and the store
Are both gone.
So Much Glass to So Much Steel
Behind a clear, glass veil
Facing a snarling, spitting sea
And the dim shadow of Georges Island
I spent nine dollars
From Mother’s retirement cheque
On gelato down at the bay
Birra Moretti in a coffee cup
And for a frat boy twist
Greek fries with chopsticks
Outside this farmer’s market
A distant cousin with payot and a suit of sky-by-night
Nods his head and fedora in a courtly fashion
To the bag boy and his toil
And the train enters and do-si-dos
With kindred spirit trains
To the strain of whistles blown
For dream time