Three Valentines & a Pint

a valentine for karen

entropic; ten states instead of one; a pharmaceutical
grace
; had missed beginning but she came on time
, any wonder, not being geographic, pocket stone
what happens in the sky; did he
mention words

that angel/devil stare; a t-shirt shallow grey
& outside, all that you would mention
porcelain-thin; to irrational only forget
back into another, meeting side
& rattle back

cycles bring your short hair glossy grown from eyes

there are so many plastic episodes; vanishing thoughts
in bluenose pert a spiel
coyote onion, oceanic trade
& back for nothing, chicken-wire

go two-by-two in twenty-one months

its faster than mother its faster than the painted bird

a pint for michael

trigger-toy, a formal archive truck
of lifted sense; fifty-odd passenger hours, unseen
training mummy drops; is overgrown
& joyous; through retrospect in blue

a standard lowering deep-fry; seconds
by the pond
; would hear you breathe

from captured flags, a firearm
goes fishing crucible toward
; burn roman
a royal hunch of oak impassive
multiple beauty tones
would ring out wrinkling; straightened out
& softened; creates a weight in gold

gone tank to town a perfect pen example
, beneath the round

tune in to watching; archived cars
& cuneiform displayed between a case

of salty depth
; could set

your watch upon

a simple heartfelt twenty minute hour

a valentine for laurie

deep torque a difference; bicycle keys a lock
& lusty envy; only charm you for your want
, a split decision
; delicate, new founded churches
kitchen-blue a compared freckle-house
in which you are allowed
to call back,
slip up & delay, set instruments
& broad the hands
if prelude called
the kind of woman you

; would light-rail nonsense fixed, a blue-jewel

fell in fumed & back & burned
,a carrot field
in handfuls, rolls, in blood & milk-beige

what nonsense talk & told, a century
full of prizes, violent cases, history

in on shadow; visible portend

the door is made a thousand drink precautions

these pages possible for trees; these
what they else the needle red

a valentine for wanda

wishing brush up on the east & what
lacks height; a muscled lore of branches
creation-thin; who knows
dramatic continent like you
,toss & turn
a backup constantly allowed for irish stage-breath,
blue in corners, curtain
down on all below

delay a layered nightmare voice a clock
who ever died

; a famine lung of leaving, boats come empty
, boats go; double-fan of elegiac jars

paternity of oxygen, & dead boughs
; it was just as then to think

what do you get when you drain empty? what
do bury ghostly in live earth?

; if the knowing gets cracked

; the world is falling water going up again
, from health & kitchens; a room

of spades called aqua & marine

rob mclennan lives in Ottawa, Canada’s glorious capital city, even though he was born there. The author of over a dozen titles, including poetry, fiction and non-fiction, he is also editor/publisher of above/ground press, Chaudiere Books, Poetics.ca (with Stephen Brockwell, poetics.ca) and ottawater (ottawater.com). He spent the 2007-8 academic year in Edmonton as writer-in-residence at the University of Alberta, and regularly posts reviews, essays and interviews at robmclennan.blogspot.com.