John W. McEwers (6/20/1980 / Nova Scotia, Halifax)

Another twinkling star mocks the darkness on my porch,
where I tip a high life and pour it down my throat.
I live in the deserted shadows of your hand-me-down love.
There were moments I missed, pinpoints of time-light
which skipped perception and stampeded straight to foggy memory.
Quietness between us. An ignored question, a roll of the eyes.
They weren't but moments, but their ghosts stuck,
lingered across my thoughts like jet contrails,
the ear-ringing echo of a spent alarm.

Now I'm all beer and no belly. Dark to the touch,
nibbling on salami and sucking down forget-you juice.

I'm empty, and haven't been having much good.

But I'm a lover-poet-warrior-man,
and I'll stand here on this porch till the slats buckle
and I sink into muddy earth, forget the dark,
despite the chill wind icing my cheeks
and the spilled beer
and the twinkling stars
and despite your being gone
forever
and despite your being happy
with my faint family, forsworn to me,
the faces of my children a flickering image
like a dead television channel
despite this,
I'll choke down the high life
and wake up with another poem
ready to spread its arms
and welcome the resistant world.

Maybe good things will get better soon hopefully,
but until then
I am John,
Me,
a man who doesn't need you,
KATE! ! !