Toast

Not a wink of sleep all night and now I'm up and all I wants is a slice of toast.

The youngster just left for school. Not even the end of October yet and already wearing his winter coat, one dropped mitten still in the porch.

I routes through the cupboard looking for the bottle of Cheez Whiz, remembers that they've changed the recipe and now you got to keep it in the fridge whether you likes it cold or not, elsewise it goes fousty.

Jesus Christ, changing the recipe of Cheez Whiz...

I'm cursing the decision makers at Kraft foods as I digs around the bottom of the jar with a butter knife produces a big shockin' gob of near neon orange covered in a weeks worth of toast crumbs.

The toast isn't poppped yet. I licks the knife clean.

A buddy of mine always makes a point of telling anyone who'll listen how much he hates Cheez Whiz. Now everytime I even sees the bottle I hears his voice:

"That stuff is only two molecules away from plastic sure!"

He'll say that as he sucks back on a cigarette, washes the taste out of his mouth by pouring a gallon of coffee down his guts.

But thats just the way, hey? The world wants to make you feel like a fuckin' jerk for getting any enjoyment out of anything. You can't have a drink cause you'll ruin your liver, can't enjoy a meal or else you'll get fat, this, that, and the other thing are gonna give you cancer, and Cheez Whiz is just a bottle of tasty plastic, you knows.

My father always says "You know when someone dies and everyone says 'Oh my, what a sin, so young and never smoked a day or drank a drop and exercised all the time...'? Well they won't say that about me."

I used to think "Jesus, dad..." But now, now I waits for my slice of white home-made bread (Fuck the multi-grains) to finish burning in the toaster while I eats Cheez Whiz off a knife.

Sandbanks (For Caleb, Haille, Alex and Erin)

Eight feet press tracks into wet sand,
attempt to race
waves that lick salt water tongues
at tiny toes
and the boy’s shoes are already soaked.

Sneakers kicked errantly into
piles of sun-dried seaweed,
the girls are skipping up the beach.

Her blonde hair flies out in disarray,
strands stuck to her mist dampened face.
An overcast day, cold for late June.
Our beautiful Newfoundland summer.

But she doesn’t feel the weather;
only sand
water
the scent of ocean.

The smallest stumbles
over sea worn driftwood.
Runs to catch up
kicking sand backwards in golden arcs.

The oldest stops,
crouches to examine tidal tokens
half buried.
The purple blue of muscle shells,
the spine covered fragility of sea urchins.

Barefooted they wade into waves,
catch breath in their throats
as the cold of sea
prickles warm skin,
drifts over sand to erase footprints.

The boy has kicked off his wet sneakers,
now walks in damp socks that collect sand
as he collects rocks and shells.

They fill jacket pockets,
make pouches of their shirts
to fill with mementos of this experience
to place amongst their child’s treasures at home.

The Essence of Memorization

Cinna-berry… She says.
You have a Cinna-berry car freshener.
He always had one of those, Marco.
He told me that whenever I smelled that smell
I’d think of him.

What a cunt. I say.
Thinking of the scents
Intertwined with memory.

How blueberry lip-gloss makes me think
of a blonde haired boy at age fourteen.
The aroma of buttered pop-corn in a dark movie theatre
and his breath, hot
and smelling of red liquorice.

At sixteen, the boy who smelled of sweat, aftershave,
and cheap cologne,
strong enough to stop your breath.
How I cannot smell the scent of Aqua-Velva
without feeling young and naiive.

Twenty and the odour of night-clubs, hot and stagnant,
two hundred moving bodies, writhing.
The stale odour of spilled alcohol,
pot being smoked secretly in corners and bathrooms,
the blue cloud of cigarette smoke
hanging in the damp, dark, air.
Notes of vanilla, orchids and sandalwood
emanating from girls on the dance-floor.
Whiskey and lust perspired through the pores
of the drunk old men who watch from the bar.
Beer on the breath of the guys who shout
Wanna dance?

At twenty-five the scent of the one I loved,
like a fingerprint, hidden underneath the scent
of his shampoo, aftershave and soap.
I breathed it in, could not fill my lungs enough.
How when he left
I slept curled in a pile of his shirts pulled from the laundry.
How as time wore on that same lingering scent
became torturous, invading my place of recovery.
The scent of strawberry Glade to mask it
can now take me to dark places.

And now,
how I can’t help but be tricked
by men who smell of cigarettes.
Feel a stirring as I watch them inhale
carcinogenic-sex through pursed lips,
exhale clouds of smoke that
cling to their clothes and hair.
I assume they’ll be kind and caring.
They carry the scent of the only man
who’s never hurt me.