[trudging along in her struggle
]
She lived with
her widower father; mother
died
of the consumption,
her body a brittle stick of
charred wood in the end
The father’s younger
brother
lived
on the other side
in a squarish house
with his wife and two kids
but no one got along
Never
liked my brother either,
guess
that’s why
I feel sorry for her
It hurt my eyes to see her
ruby red lipstick throbbing
in the
summer heat
as she walked that lonely road,
dust on her white high heels.
August Light
when
the evening
creeps in-
to the empire of day,
the light
turns
nostalgic.
i can see my mother
in her green
smock
[with clam-shells opening
and closing breathing
in desperation]
buzzing
around
my dad
who’s sitting out-
side beside the garden
on
a kitchen chair in
a sheet
to keep himself
clean get-
ting
his hair cut,
flinching at every knick
every
itch
i hated
her in
that green smock
because i knew i was next:
the shaver
and snipping
scissors
mosquito-
biting
my neck—the tiny
filings digging
into
the skin
irritating to a need to scratch—
so we
sat and suffered with-
in
the lush garden of
Rousseau—
dark
cucumber jungle patch,
nude tomato
plants and pear-snake tree insects
circle,
looking
for an opportunity to feed.
And it is august
i remember
most—with its warm
kind
of light
shaded with shadows and
full
of home,
sadness,
and sense of loss.
By a Chinese Lamp
Laura
Nyro
sang her siren
song
softly
upstairs
by a Chinese lamp
in
my
mother’s room
dragon red oriental yellow
and tassels with
prisms
of light
attached
the colours, flavour
and smells
of
Singapore, Kowloon,
Macau
[long-hair,
black pools
of luxurious oil on
the shoulders—
slanted- inscrutable
sharp as knives]
mystery
women
in slitted cheong sams
intoxicating
smoke
and evil
fingers with needles
for
nails a 1930s noir
poster in art deco style
Chinatown, my Chinatown
so soon too young
she was gone
too soon
the
things she
missed with
such a short life
her impassioned breathing,
poetry
on a
lover’s tongue children laughing
into
adulthood. grand- children
calling Bachan!
out of love and anticipation
the sauce of
conversations at dinner the loom
of darkness
weaving
the coat of daylight
and
the music of Laura
Nyro
upstairs
by a Chinese lamp
i sit on the bed
to
contemplate
the glow of her
absence.
and when i die . . .
Down a Country Road
sun flooded
the road like clear
invisible
-blue
water
the dust between
my
toes
felt like i wasn’t
wearing shoes
my clothes were loose
my skin
full
of light and rain
my hair black as an ocean
sky
the dirt road up
to Ito-san’s barn
was
slow-going with
dead tractors & cracked, busted
wagon beds lying in-state
on the
grass be-side
the processional
the wood of sheds and
buildings
was grey
wormwood —
burrowed decayed like
broken teeth hanging
limply from their gums
but Ito-san’s face glowed
like
the hinterland an Issei pioneer
surveying
the harsh fields his fields. (finally)
the road led to a time of plenty
Mizuno-san wore
a
smile like i
put on a
winter coat to keep warm
but
i
saw him
on autumn days when
his smile
and his round full face
were hidden
by
bushels of tomatoes
onions
and cucumber
all to keep us during the winter
to come
and he laughed when i grimaced
at the gobo the nasubi the
kabocha
he understood but
kachan squirreled them away
in the cold room
below.
his gifts led to bows of gratitude,
and the
gravel
road wound through
a stand of trees
to a barking dog chained to
its house with water bowl
as weathervane
measuring rain
w
ind
and in the distant fields
of
strawberries, cabbage
and lettuce uncle Harry laboured,
his
muscled arms
pulling
in crop like a Colossus before
Elysian
plains
he loved my dad don’t know why
he just did
called him “boshin”
talked in wind rushing tones
rattling windows
with biru as his Muse
he spoke English to me
only one who did as if he
were interested
he & i
walked the fields
one summer and he taught
me to ride a bicycle
i wobble, i careen, i fall before
his strong hand steadies me
just
like any uncle should
i wondered about the dog though
it
had no name, never petted just
fed and
went unloved
a country dog driven to desperate barking
at any stranger that
came up
the road.
a time of friendship and practical cruelty.
corn roasts in august
the humidity
attracted
mosquitoes as our
guests
yet the sweet kernels
touched
and
then coated by
luxurious butter
made the insects feel welcome
oka and auntie laughed
over stories
and
they cooked with love
and
generosity
as ingredients
and we all watched the
sunfall
our fire rose
higher and
higher until it was time to go home
goodnight
uncles, aunts cousins
laughter silenced muted talk. [i
hate the silence of missing you]
and i stepped into Ito-san’s barn
upon reaching
the top
of the hill at the end of the
visible road
the air [spangled with
dustlight
insects of fantasy
and pungent incense]
expanded and swelled
to fill
the cathedral-temple
around & above me.
i bowed before the altar of
the dead the memories of avuncular kindness
auntie love acceptance & kindness
the sad generous facial creases
as i held out
an
offering of warmheart love
the only emotion I have left.
it is a time of grieving
A House of Crying Women
No One
lives in the house on Ivy Avenue any-
more but it once was
a
home
of
immigrants,
struggling to un- derstand
the language,
the customs the
food;
a diary of copied stories a book
of phonics a
spelling workbook
but a woman cried upstairs
for home, for country
for 3 sisters, 2 brothers for her
old-before-
her-time mother
all dead long before &
after
the war
but
she listened to
them in the crackling
firedark hours of her life.
she heard them weeping
down the hallway shadows
when she
realized she
was all alone
and a father
deep
with-
in the basement
communed with his loving
sister
his empty mother,
with the ghost
bright eyes, and long forgotten
aunts: hearing their voices, in long ago
photographs.
and even the house next door 101
Ivy Italians a
community of
Toronto immigrants
no one felt comfortable
with the hyphen no one was
Canadian
the italian women cried for their
lost mother
giving birth
to a dead sister
and i am nestled in the pocket
of a brother just passed
away his wife (despises me)
cries amongst the debris of
his life but i sense
our mother laments over
his soul
perhaps forgiving
him for his pettiness
for his anger
and for his stinginess
and i too am alone in
the
house of crying
women
thinking about him
and trying . . .
trying
trying . . .
to forgive.
kiyooka airs
fall-
ing tumb-
ling
stumbling thru
kyoto
airs from
the balconies of kiyomizu-
dera
what is your wish?
longer life to see . . .
to see my grand-
son
become a
doctor
to dance & stumble at
his
wedding
to hear his arguments
bubble up
and burst their logic
all over
me
to be treated
in my grand-daughter’s
clinic to kiss
her cheek
turned red and then
pink
at her wedding
to hear her
boast
of her successes
while feeling
my failures.
but I will not survive
the fall
of wishes
and regrets
kyoto airs bejewelled
with light
and stars
too jagged, too foreign, too
thin
to hold me up
yet
the resin trees
breathe
deep
as I descend into
their depths
perhaps to come out
into
the light.
again
Legend has it that if a person jumps from a balcony of the Kiyomizu-dera temple in Kyoto and survives, his or her wish will come true.
For my brother’s wish and Roy Kiyooka’s dream of Kyoto
June 2012
Come With Me
; Come
with me
warmheart let me
feel your sea-breath hand
in mine as it flutters and
smoothes
my fears away
come
with
me