___Trainee__ 

The fish vendor's daughter's eight-by-ten gloss skin 

Shines from its store front magazine rack 

Perched unappealingly posch,too colourful,beside comestibles 

On Akbar's shelves. Akbar is selling her lines by lottery 

To Sharma who buys for ten bucks a square. 

Rham, a red turbaned notary public 

With his hair braided all the way under the neck 

Fingers spangling minty gold rings, reassures Sharma over latest transactions. 

Sadji in the back of an income tax firm helpfully 

Reveals my deductible earnings. A client walks up 

And Sadji twists free, instantly customer courteous. 

Sharma beside me borrows his phone. 

Old white-turbaned men with rolled up beards 

Debate Mrs. Gina's latest whim. She stands by the cash 

With her beautiful daughters, smelling of cinnamon curry and rice, registering 

Antagonistic points on the copper swills of her 

Hand dyed gowns. Moguls of Main street 

Meander in the meaningless mayhem of merchant's land. 

A coffee store owned for years by Frau Schiller 

May fall at last into East Indian hands. 

Sharma's fingers tremble a little as he itches 

The stitched side of his dark brown nose; his mouth draws thin 

His eyes vacate; he thinks of business, his wife and secretary Malti 

Who sits in an office typing for him. 

Another young Punjab speaks German to me. 

His Clerk's tongue click-kichs in the drum of my ear. 

" Thank you" he sprechs," for everything." 

The whining harmonic background voice is also on sale at discount price. 

Looking across the Anglican Street 

Sharma says it will not take long 

For a trainee to learn(climbing into his company car) 

The correct sales approach(fingering his vest) 

And the right technique(inserting the key) 

For successful ad sales and(now looking at me) 

A polite way to make money. 

 

                                  rjm Vancouver (1980)

  +++By Central School+++ 

Light! Bright! Clean! Green! The whirly-bird-insect-machine 

Hovers unseen above the children's school ground scream. 

Jacob has a singing sword, swashbuckling lord, 

Daniel swings a rod of oak, 

Thaven might be a man of magic 

But the spells Craig casts consist of caring. 

Justin defends himself with karate 

While Jessie wants to prove he too can kick. 

I am battle sick and war weary, 

I sit on the steps and make no pretense. 

I am not the fortunate one. 

And not finished fighting. Soon again to throw my spirit 

Exposed, out of the trenches, into the fray, 

Where defeats will be often as victories. 

 

Angela is a saint to her brother, 

Jennifer's freedom a gymnast's discipline, 

Belinda bats baseballs better than boys 

While Trixie is longing to be a fine Lady. 

I am lovelost and slow in forgiving. 

I am waiting for the Green Dragon to come down 

And whisper what will happen next. 

He hovers unseen, suspended on beating wings, watching: 

I wait for you. 

In September, the time of my birth, of the death 

Of green-leafed apparel, of sentimental solemn suns, 

Of harvesting grapes and fat fruit falling 

I wait to be picked and eaten as fodder 

I wait to be fit and nourished beside you. 

I wait to call you battlecompanion. 

 

I sit on stone steps regarding the omen of scavenger crows fighting for food. 

Jacob acts out his stand up impressions,uncanny 

Accurate imitations of TV personalities; 

I should teach him a character of caring and daring. 

Others I should teach what a loss it is not to care, what a shame 

 not to dare. 

I should be a teacher of Nations 

Of sons and fathers of Nations 

Of mothers and daughters of Nations 

I should break down the fences surrounding the schools 

That children learn defense against evil 

And Evil (which is always excess or absence) has no need. 

They teach their children intellectual freedom 

Then roll them up, and forbid them power 

Even over their own acts. I should sit like 

An old neck-stretched black Raven and stare at 

This structured educational mess until the little 

Green dragonfly comes down and whispers what to do. 

When I know what to do I will fall to the Earth 

Like a hailstorm and destroy what has festered 

And holds itself high behind 

Complexities of adultness. I will rage days and nights 

Until the child can stand firm in its own free form and become what it wants. 

 

I wait for you while the children caress me or shun me 

Or press me or try to impress me. 

I wait even though I'm impatient and ailing. 

I wait because I must march through the door 

And expose myself and say," Here is the man beneath the clothing, 

Here is the fabric controlling the body, 

Here is the story from outside your school room 

Here is a great cleansing of the unnecessary, 

Here are the old and long-forgotten 

Whose lives have lost challenge and purpose and meaning, 

Here are those who deny others being, 

And those who are denied being, who exist but do not matter" 

Become a man who takes up their cause! 

 

Suddenly the insect descends, streaming directly towards my eyes, 

Landing at the back of my neck. 

I gather it's glory on the tip of my finger, 

Asking the children to look at its wings. 

It is stentor of an unknown world. 

When it rises up all the children follow. 

 

And suddenly I know what I must do. 

 

                                        Sept. 1984--Kelowna  rjm

 

 

     ***** Demons Ride the Soul ***** 

Whatsoever I try to build up that woman 

    Slices apart with her will. 

She's a pink naked girl riding a horse away from the Sun, 

     Her flesh lacerated. 

Blood beads from her eyes, the doll's dumb round face, a dissected heart- 

I am a wolf struck nearly dead. 

Hunting, hunted. 

She won't let me be how gentleman act, 

She derides by far from a snickering space- 

Bubba her blubbering Baptist boyfriend 

Bounces on bubbles of beer bubble mania, 

Boredom, euphoria, depression mix 

With bitterness inside his cocktail brain. 

He thinks himself a smart charming drake 

While in fact a bombastuous lard bellied bore, 

Bullies her twins with ill-tempered orders 

So he can crawl like fat bastard hound back to his sly dark bitch. 

I am alone, and that's the catch 

On which my private pelt would be hung 

If ever they could pin my tail, 

Caught in the cage of a rental agreement. 

Weary and scarred from former battles 

I thrash out as ever a Wolf King shackled 

Strapped against his freedom bonds. 

I am a wolf and sung since manhood 

War cries from a throat of rage, 

I raise the wolf and his lonesome howl 

For that is the song of most men on this earth, 

A beastly love opera snarling out of a wolf's ritual knash-mask 

Which I wear on my host sometimes 

To bark at demons - demons who ride 

Out of batiqued blankets, demons sliding 

On warm water beds when vinyl and slippery 

They cannot be cornered, I track them down 

And snap them up, though they hide on walls 

In paintings of orgasmic chaos, I find them, 

Sniff them out into carved leeches 

Writhing on a cane of wood. 

Silence is the sea i run to, lapping a drink from, thirsty, alone. 

But by shores of this lake they hold nightly bacchanalias,upstairs 

Lecheries of sound, of bad rock and roll. 

Hypocrite Bubba bellows a bark voice to the twins 

      To sleep in their beds. 

Children annoy him. 

The sharp,poor,innocent questions of children 

Puncture his perfectly fraudulent poise. 

He will teach them only that life is a party 

From which we must learn to eliminate hangovers. 

The woman sees me a bumbling bachelor 

Serving her kids when they play or cry. 

That her kids should be served she takes for granted; by teachers, 

Buy strangers, artists and friends, but I have discovered 

The twins dejection wailing behind their hurting games. 

Only they can uncover my true identity, patron saint and native healer, wary ghost wolf, 

Slinking home to a home which is half his home, 

Wolf disappears downstairs in his den. 

Bubba lays claim to the art of chess, 

But out on the wild range I would grind up his pieces. 

The girl-bitch is not content as a woman, 

She loves to swear, smoke and rule like a man. 

The Houndman cannot be happy with one woman, 

Slobbering he trots through old territory, 

Leaving piss marks in nightclub latrines 

Drooling, whining, salivating, panting. 

A mother she. 

He, a father would be. 

My brother the Christian won't visit our place, 

Where demons often ride my soul. 

So I run long and lean over urban landscapes. 

A Silver Shadow, I peer out of Northern nights,silhouetted 

Briefly on a ridge in front of a full white moon. 

Trap teeth leap and bite at my feet, my offspring die 

 from gunshot wounds. 

I remain an outlaw who won't be tamed 

While mates fall quickly from poisons or snares. 

I had friends once, eagles and otters, ravens and coyotes.who could not flee. 

The old wiry wolves of civilisation who raised their cubs solid, 

They know why I howl at her Generation's bedroom door. 

But a bayonet lies on top of her fridge, 

Stainless steel butcher knives in her cupboards. 

An axe outside. Prophylactics in his wallet. 

With scissors she decides to destroy her son's t-shirt 

For failing to pick it up on command. 

Wonder how well she quartered her first husband's humble heroics. 

When I leave that place she tears my clothing. 

Bubba huffs up his lap dog anger. 

In retreat,as always, I go to the wild streets whistling 

To new trails of adventure, hustling, driving- 

        In search of my Wolfslager, 

        My gentle Maria.

 

 

                 ++ Seeing Eye Dog ++ 

Once upon a city street where madness in motion 

Made many mindless 

I met my young Polish boy friend Adam 

Wearing white denim and an old gold cross. 

It was May and May blindness was in his eyes 

So I, an old sighthound, gave him direction 

Leading through turnstiles of human procession 

Across intersections of frenzied commotion 

Into my still room of bare essentials 

Including a fleece-like rug we lay upon. 

We lay upon an old fleece rug 

After tumbling about and playing strip poker 

Until suddenly I knew I was leashed and collared 

And would lead him that way a long time forever 

While he, in turn, would feed me the Manna 

Of his unpolluted manchild mind. 

I tongued his tanned skin and licked his clean stomach 

As he petted me and clung to my neck. 

We're not fond friends  we're paired for survival 

I can pace without him 

He can see without me 

But in Happilyland and Everafter 

The Polish prince with round brown eyes 

Belongs to a vision under broad wings 

Of the German wolf King and of Aechemenes.

 

  (( Anger in the Month of Janus)) 

My boots shine black and I do not care 

I drive my truck through a dim dismal day. 

My spirit is numb and graded over, 

Plowed to the side like dirty snow. 

Who will heal my hatred this month, 

Who will smooth out my scarred, pock-marked ego, 

Who will say' come in through my door' 

What child shall I touch when all are too cool 

To be taught by a man who does not teach school. 

I march and drive to an angry drum 

I want to push old people off the road 

I should have married that smart girl 

In High School who all the other guys thought was a fox. 

Oh no, smile widely,wolfspiritman, 

Collect your bills in bullets this week, 

Deliver the Furnishings of bitter endurance, 

Not even my friend can calm my anger 

'Speak' he says, though he would not listen 

If I howled my frustration tires would pop 

If I barked out my pain it would shut off the engines 

When he kisses his girl she makes him better 

Who should I kiss to make life good again? 

When lovers awake they are strange to me 

They have stopped to rest easy 

While I drove on angry 

Searching for gateways. 

When they laugh at suffering my anger festers. 

They will go at it madly until all is shut out- 

Hunger oppression fear illness 

Oh but loving should charge out with a banner of justice 

Loving should cure and protect and reveal 

Loving should not build a house on a hill 

But deliver the poor and reform the imprisoned. 

If a family is raised to shut strangers out 

It can live secure in a subdivision 

But loving opens its doors when possible 

And bars it's shutters only when necessary. 

Loving is never closed for the night, saved up in a bank, 

Or grown suddenly cold, 

Loving still wants to speak to a stranger. 

I speak in ideals for I am angry 

And have no time to find out if a passing stranger 

Is coward, murderer, saint or fool. 

Are you a man who has killed his own childhood? 

Then weep for your heart will grow bitter and old. 

Are you a man who has kept his child lively? 

Rejoice then you have saved something pure, 

And though you be battleweary and broken, 

Have hope, war rages but peace may follow. 

Break through this stage and you may get clear. 

Look forward, look back. 

This is the month of beginnings and endings. 

 

                     Kelowna-Jan 12-1985

 

   *** Estella Millard *** 

Her eyes are the wood shock of future shock 

They are doctors her eyes having seen too much 

And yet not enough wide and fearful and 

Frantic controlled they scan and defend 

By narrowing when her own joke's humor tickles her to insecurity.

She's the wishwelling wonder child of a mother's spirit willing her 

World her way  bear spirits  wolf spirits  wind spirits 

Howling healing helping raven nirvana yoga 

Insatiability contemptability  anger vengeance 

Tribal pride Denet dancer dancing my scope cannot focus the exact 

Momentus of her being or her seeing me 

Or how we might have a purpose or not 

To explore to seek to boldly go where no woman before 

As through dark stars and immense reaches of space 

Her eyes project broken rainbows 

They stir and move within a realm of perfect spheres that never close 

Like stone frog bowls inviting to eat 

And like vulvas asking to enter 

And even like to a cold chameleons' eyes 

Flickering away changing sighting across obstacles for prey 

They pray they're priestess' eyes they're waiting waiting 

Inside the valley for the hunt  for the kill 

For the long calm after. 

 

                          Kelowna  1981

     #### Dawn Breaks at the Roadhouse Cafe #### 

 

Softer than the night is Dawn's light breaking 

Beneath withered weeping tree leaves picture still outside

And still with Summers green growing 

But also brown patches boulevards brightened by night lamps 

Become brighter still still blanketing hills 

The low clouds hide distant things 

Here however the waitress scurries 

(woman I must wait on you) hurries her orders 

On trays balanced by both slim hands 

White fans sweep shadows in ceiling-circles 

Circe fills my cup but her name is Tracy 

With a smile at once tender, professional and recurring 

A smile that goes on and on into the morning 

Exchanging silver and supplying demands 

A smile that serves the job but also 

Opens its own secret morning Joy. 

How does she bring the Daybreak from blackness? 

With a song of her own daylight 

Spread out over the customer's breathing 

Like a subtle veil uncovered again and again 

As though she had switched on the dawn 

From a stereo kept tuned all night. 

The mall sign signals'OPEN ALL SUNDAY' 

Before I remember Aurora's secret 

She is bright with love,a handmaiden of happiness 

I remember a time I knew what happiness was 

Streisand sings 'Memory' and the night is over. 

We bachelors and stragglers and two men keeping vigil 

Pay our bills and the cafe is cleared. 

The tape repeats itself three times completely 

Before the decorative deep green frames 

Green and white striped table spreads 

Patio umbrellas and gladiolas in boxes 

Say to me,'We are fresh with Dawn always.' 

I reply,' Let me make a copy.' 

 

                      Kelowna 1984