Sample poems from ‘Begging the Question’

ATTACHMENTS

periodically I lose what I become too precious about

that indian scarf I wore for definition disappeared
from my pale neck on a mountain walk
I didn’t know it was gone until I’d descended
sheltered from blurred edges and a cryptic sun

a ring I couldn’t take my eyes off
silver emblazoned with a golden spiral
every conversation every ulterior move
lead with that hand dizzying me into blind spots
I would never wholly return from

frequently I lose my sense of direction
and have to play tourist to find my way home

I have lost the moment the hour the day
and once in another tongue the will to live

I lost you of course but that was written

after dreaming I lose my place in the waking world
everywhere I look strangers in a strange land

I am always startled to find someone knows my name

CAUSE

there’s a man who wakes our street
to that hour between witching and dawn
most used for dying and for being born
he paces and moans like he already knows
who will be taken and who will be left alone
those of us who dare untuck a sleep warm arm
raise a dream filled head and peek from safe houses
at the shape of such a man but it is the hour
and the tone that warn we roll over keep listening
some of us urging him on and on
some of us double checking locks and the breathing
of sleeping children some of us remembering
where the bullets are hidden our trigger fingers
twitching like guilt between the sheets some of us
think we understand and loved ones have to hold us
back from running out into the night ready to join
our rusty voice to his desperate for a cause

ARROW

this is how it happens you are exactly who you think you are
someone who’s been around long enough to know the world
is spinning without needing to feel it when out of the blue
carbon copy day a young woman half skipping toward you
waving long arms and shouting hey happy new year happy
solstice all piercings and dreadlocks when she gets close enough
she says sorry she thought you were someone else someone
she once knew someone named arrow and all the rest of the way
home you wonder what freedoms a name like that a name like
arrow might have meant for a woman like you perhaps a market stall
or self defence classes a degree in emotional intelligence hitch hiking
alone at night eyes like star charts amazon women warrior friends
dropping in for morning tea and all your dreams flying out like arrows
from the scar that marks the spot where a breast used to be
this is how it happens how you find yourself suddenly airborne
and spinning through that first tunnel of light