Poems From Fenwick Tower



  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

  Freshly drawn water

  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,

  Warm and asleep after a good meal,

  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