still crazy after all these years

8 years ago today was the last time i talked to my mother. i remember sitting on my bed in montreal, slow-brewing winter storm outside. we talked weekend-style - it was a saturday - an hour-long conversation, verbal tussle with a smile. politics. i seem to remember something about kyoto, but i'm not even sure if that's possible. the reform party, certainly, and the dramas in her condo. i had to go to pick up that old creaky violin i was getting fixed, with the full intent of playing it. (i never play it.) i remember walking up st-denis on the way home, the city blowing with white. i bought d. a ring in all that snow. it was time for a new commitment. it was time to live in a promise. it was also before the towers came down. before, even, the global panic party for the millenial changeover. it seems so long ago. it seems like yesterday.

a lot can happen in the blink of an eye. you were alive. then you weren't. a lot can happen in 8 years, too. so much i'd like to be able to tell you. like, for example, that i got an interview at mac.

i wonder what you'd think about that.


Buhrstone

Morning after morning

The awakening village howls
Like an insect
About to be dipped in amber.

I separate myself from the sky

But still carry the inevitable
Dream of your body
Covered in butterflies or in bees.

Here's a living blanket for your grave.

Here's who I've quietly become:
A slightly wilder version of you. Your hands
Knead the dough for my bread

And my husband's flesh, thick and smooth.
They wash my breasts and hips, they light
my cigarette, they crack my beer.

You've been dead too long.

Morning after morning
The heavy amber of you
Around my neck, inside the heels

Of my boots. I wear your gloves.
Your winter scarves, your winter hair,
And that heavy shearling coat.

Soon I will forget how to preserve you.

But for now I continue to dream daily,
Morning after morning: your body blooming
In yellow wings, thousands of butterflies alighting

And you just lie there.

Morning after morning
The orange grass keeps burning
Under the grey grey sky.

-- Olena Katyiak Davis