A LITTLE HOMELESS
I look a little homeless, have stopped
changing clothes, close-shaving, washing my hair.
all that was important is understood now
to be without substance, so much
vanity, vanity, all is… and it all comes down
to a small fire of sterno or elder twigs or birch bark—
12-word poems in charcoal on shale. that
central fire of flickering blood, dug-out canoes
drifting from nailbed to iris,
the dreamer twitching like that very flame
………………………………………….spearing from the old steel drum.
home under the bridge, in the chest,
in the thickening dark where the population
of those you have loved grows.
Capitus The First, enthroned upon
the spinal column, oversees the typesetter
madly working through the dream hours and their aftermath.
all fun and, you know, games, until someone
is hugged by an ape of angina, or learns the mold
has draped over everything, pushing cancerous hyphae
into pancreas, a lung, a once-nurturing breast.
at home on unsettled earth, the shift of focus:
I continue to love, of course, I simply
do not need to be loved anymore,
the mirror gone, the rifle sight turned 180.
as long as I continue to make myself chuckle
I will continue to feed myself and pray;
but I do not groom. and in the treetops
the wind is untroubled—this strange creature,
this unkempt chimp, is no threat.
looks a little homeless—
…………………………………….and perhaps I am.
certain of the trajectory, I mourn, even as I admit
to looking back every—but only—
……………………once in a while.
Author’s Bio
Noah Zacharin is a Montreal-born writer and musician. Before finding himself in Toronto, where, for some reason he ceased sending out his work, he was a widely-published poet, translator, and critic. He never stopped loving words and is working to relearn the craft. Plans for 2020 include a new record and his first collection of poems.
www.noahsong.com