and liquorice,
yea some camphor and jallop,
oft'times basil, lemon or rhubarb
--- all sent from Glasgow
in wooden boxes
stout as pioneer hearts.

***************************************

Page 62
MOCCASIN

Backwoods cabin, opera house
from the pines awash with stars,
skullduggery in place over spruce hills
dredged to open revolt
against invading plough --
where greenest leaves
in a miser's hand part
rotting gold bags
all nugget strewn, step to step,
with water speaking magic
over the sound of countless woodland ducks.

Hocus-pacus, the
flies are sleeves over the world,
black granite pull-overs
slung thru the air
a twinkling of the eye invokes
funeral trees, deerskin in colour,
the rabbit in the hat behind
rich birchbark racing thru the dark.

***************************************

Page 63
THE BULLFROG

He sat with no more compunction
than an eel fish
big-faced, bloated,
the complexion of a beehive
-- a dragnet of emotions
crammed into a tumbler
upended in water.

His eyelids wore the effort
of horseblinders, a
spongy leather
masquerading as torpedoes
and I saw him
lonely at the crossroads
matted grass,
a strip of wire, cold current
chasing flecks about
his person, then lunging green
exploded into rapacity --
caressed the awaiting fly strewn stick
with emerald mouth &
coffers of appetite.

***************************************

Page 64
ANCESTRAL MEMORY

Patrician to my plebian,
aristocratic leaning versus
unbridled backwoods feeling --
distinct Old World breeding
countering rudest colonial lean-to;
his carcass lay, roadworthy,
blinking back cold starlight
with all the forest as silent voyeur
stretching for a look,
black fur & quills
in disarray like Crazy Horse's warpaint
after the Big Horn,
this roughneck Canadian porcupine
shot clean with bumper & chrome.

Then little hedge-pig
quaint as porcelain china cup
half a world away
greeting pints of milk
in an English doorway
half his scalp torn thru
dirty, British lorry choking fumes
the petrol in its tank loose.

***************************************

Page 65
ENTRY POINT

Ants colonized it
-- huge abodes littered with the dead
(leaves, sticks, the occasional granulated insect
piled high, totemic-fashion)
reaping a fortune in scenery,
though probably not food Ojibways were next --
their tell-tale encampment by
pocket-sized waterfall,
inlets off a winding cataract
& moss, loam-thick with black soil
a fu