The Pen in your Hand.

A story by the poet Ann Kestner I read this morning… I wanted very much to share it.

“My father worked with wood and metal and concrete. I work with ink and paper and metaphors.

It is not a far stretch between engineer and poet. We do the same work.

Reading my poetry in Whitevale, Ontario.

A Sad Child

I love how Margaret Atwood manages to let go here – utterly – and yet still retain perfect control. It’s what she does best, I think. She gives the reader a breathless exhilarating free fall in her poems and all the while we know we are in expert hands.

A sad child

You’re sad because you’re sad.
It’s psychic. It’s the age. It’s chemical.
Go see a shrink or take a pill,
or hug your sadness like an eyeless doll
you need to sleep.

Well, all children are sad
but some get over it.
Count your blessings. Better than that,
buy a hat. Buy a coat or pet.
Take up dancing to forget.

Forget what?
Your sadness, your shadow,
whatever it was that was done to you
the day of the lawn party
when you came inside flushed with the sun,
your mouth sulky with sugar,
in your new dress with the ribbon
and the ice-cream smear,
and said to yourself in the bathroom,
I am not the favorite child.

My darling, when it comes
right down to it
and the light fails and the fog rolls in
and you’re trapped in your overturned body
under a blanket or burning car,

and the red flame is seeping out of you
and igniting the tarmac beside your head
or else the floor, or else the pillow,
none of us is;
or else we all are.

More Toronto Book Launch photos!

More from launch of The Music of Leaving, my new book of poetry, on Saturday evening, November 1^st at the Women’s Art Association of Canada in Toronto’s Yorkville.