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Two Poems




posthumous

I dream a rocky coast somewhere in Galapagos a lizard

penetrates me lazily with forever on his mind winking one staid eye

pretending to be wise as though age has anything to do with knowing truth

opus dust rises like a soft slow mist from his ancient smoky bones

and under this duress I reluctantly confess to knowing well before

we started this affair that you were buried long ago

that your spirit is an orchestra of blistered plastic

comes as no surprise since you reside in hell

your open mouth upon my skin the soft and secret whispered wing of dragonfly

and only when you come in me do you cry out.

Daddy prove how very much you burn for me.

on this beach far from your tomb where I torment

another lover very much alive forgetting you

for one brief moment

I prepare for endless rain of winter. this paradise of vodka bottles

washed in on the mindless tide reminding me of

fucking you after you went dead

of how you never told a single secret even to yourself

but you know who you are.

I think of pimps I knew on Yonge Street with their purple Cadillacs

and of the city hospital

where you went to hide from everyone and everything ever done by you

declaring mental bankruptcy by wiping out your memory

how completely you forgot.

last rites are on my mind with this confession: I think of you

every time I pass the Jaguar dealer on Burrard

and also I confess to every act I've done or dreamed because I can't let go:

my constant fantasy of fucking with that cat

of being rich as whiskers laced with cream

of trading in my soul for wicked candies doled out to

knowing little girls like me

by faceless boring men with raincoats on

interchangeable as blades of grass and all equally as dead as you.

of being buried too alongside you, and of the perfect darkness

do I dream



what will

what will happen when you place your face under

hers and she moves and she

moves and when next you look she is gone is

gone and then and when you

place your faith in something moving in some

one moving faster than the sky faster

than the moon the moon she sets she rises she

grows full then fades

what will happen then when no moon

rises when no star sets what will when

love blows she blows when lust when love she spins and

turns and ebbs like ocean what

will happen then and when the sand she lifts she

lifts in waves in rhythm to your rigid heart your

upright heart and she blows around like dust like

dust and when she rests far away from you some

where and she moves she lifts she blows she fades and you

are left alone what will happen then will you

run will you run you run like water down a path her voice

fastened to your soul forever, for ever there is, what will

About the Author

Lynnette D'anna

Lynnette D'anna is the author of the novels sing me no more (1992), RagTimeBone (1994), fool's bells (1998), Belly Fruit (2000), and vixen (2001). She lives in Winnipeg. https://lynnettedanna.com