Table of Contents
October (the destruction of construction paper)
Looking at the sky through dahlias (remembering remembering my mother) 10
Well, the cat's dead 11
Visiting the heavens in Toronto 13
Antony Gormley is a hypocrite 14
The Boogie Woogies are on their last legs 15
But the Boogie Woogies are going to disappear 16
Four versions of Jacob 17
I expect Castro will be dead by the time you read this poem 18
november (the trick of two worlds)
George, the year you carved your howl 20
Mom rescued Alex Colville from the library 21
I learned about guns from Alexa Colville 22
Alex won't be here forever 23
Misquoting Albert Einstein 25
Clover sickness and the disappearance of bees 27
In my mother's house when we said sorry 28
I get the email too- 29
At 4 a.m. I lifted Timothy from my nightstand 30
The most beautiful things I've seen in October 31
It-is-having-a-long-neck 34
I'm afraid, and it's not just the disappearance of bees 37
The day Mom failed to rescue Icarus from the Dutch 41
The dessert comes after the ham 43
Out with a whimper 44
The physical properties of light 45
Some people sit behind a curtain to talk to the Lord 46
december (a bowl of strawberries in an empty room)
I wonder if I'll be like Georgia, rummaging 48
I was painting a door when my sweetheart's drained face 49
I thought the sky would be different 50
Mom and I, sunk on the brown couch 51
A bowl of strawberries in an empty room 52
I told my first stranger I was pregnant 57
january (it's impossible to put my finger on that bird)
The first movement (adagio with seabirds, perhaps the Beck's petrel-thought to be extinct but assumed alive) 60
The second movement (allegro with finches, most likely yellow in great number) 63
The third movement (to 31 minutes and 19 seconds of Marais la Nuit, Neko's spring peepers) 64
february (browsing frog and toad together)
Browsing Frog and Toad together 70
I visited an online forum, Kathy and Ottawa 72
I wrote about fading Mondrians (and it was after that) 73
Fire, earth, water, bicycle 74
march (a denouement with bicycles)
Oma's at the sink, though I'm told 80
The sand tiger shark is tougher than me 81
There's an albino pigeon that lands from time to time 83
They dissected the bullfrog and revealed a belly full 84
It's the small things that save us 85
The extraordinary feat of calling my mother 86
Notes 91
