short poem – these five minutes

“And when the revolution frees me” by Sasha in the bedroom

By: Sasha 06/21/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesdaughter, Father’s Day, fathers and daughters, five minutes, poem, poetry, these five minutes, unedited

Sunday June 21, 2020
2:07pm
5 minutes
Because We Are Not Taken Seriously
Stephen Dunn

Happy Father’s Day
I am beyond words grateful to know you
As a daughter does
As a daughter can
Know your fortitude and your ferocity
Your intelligence and your imagination
Your creativity and your generosity
Your tenderness and your tenacity

I am grateful for every chapter of our story
From being the baby in your arms asleep
To my baby in those same arms dancing
How you hold what you love close
The pull of time a web that weaves
something magic
ancient and new

The revolution won’t wait for you
And I admire how you know this
How you listen with full attention
To what we are saying
Punctuated by deep breath and tears
The prickle of your pride
Fathering daughters is something
you are well suited for

“if the seas of cities” by Sasha in her bedroom

By: Sasha 06/16/202006/17/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesdesire, five minutes, game, light, poem, poetry, these five minutes, unedited, wanting

Tuesday June 16, 2020
11:49pm
5 minutes
if something should happen
Lucille Clifton

If I position myself just so
in the right light
She thinks
Maybe then maybe then
maybe then the truth will land
and the nervous giggle won’t crescendo
fall flat in the face of so much strange

A third of life in the rear view mirror
at best
She thinks that she knows about
seasons changing
And how to tend to bruised palm
The best method for soft boiling an egg
What she needs when she’s tired and lonely

If I position myself
In the magic hour patina
Feel for the dew of desire
She wonders
about asking outright or if
it’s most palatable to keep playing
the game a little longer

“All above us is the touching” by Sasha in the basement

Sunday June 7, 2020
4:02pm
5 minutes
Elegy
Aracelis Girmay

All of the lonely people wishing for a touch
on the forearm from the new fingertips
the sizzle of the egg
the tongue on the earlobe
wishing for a spark
the fire starts low in the belly
spreads quick
suddenly there is no pandemic
is no risk
is nothing
but the want
for a touch
the longing for a taste

Above us is the promise of change not made
by someone at a podium or with a microphone
the sun watches as we disobey orders
as they burn cities
topple oppressive monuments into murky water

I’ve been clenching my jaw again
scratching my throat
losing sleep over the dead ones
the living

“I didn’t blink when the water” by Sasha at her kitchen table

By: Sasha 06/06/202006/06/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poembait, crying, disractions, reasons, water

Saturday June 6, 2020
1:15pm
5 minutes
The Truth
Ross Gay

She says she can’t stop crying
and I can’t either but for
the same reasons
and different flooded shoes

Don’t take the bait of the snarl
a curly tongue wearing pepper and fear
the same reasons
and another restless morning

The distractions are numb toes
and scrolling clown faces
try to temper the burn
peel the puffed grave

“This describes well what I’ve said” by Sasha on the couch

Tuesday June 2, 2020
1:03am
5 minutes
Mencius
Mencius

You say “I’m sorry that that happened to you”
I say “Thank you”

It’s the kind of exchange that builds muscle
slowly over time

You tell me about midwifing a cow
and smoking hash on the beach

I tell you a few strange details
starting and stopping

not sure what’s too much
I am most often too much

Peering out the window into darkness
lightning strikes

the sky illuminated in wonder
and loneliness

I didn’t set out to write something so sad
but it’s a strange time to want to touch

toes while lying on the floor
trading songs like passport stamps

here’s where I’ve been
and here and here

“And you intend to remain there a few days” by Sasha on the living room floor

Monday June 1, 2020
10:39pm
5 minutes
Murder on the Orient Express
Agatha Christie

You intend to remain in your sad place for a few days
build a little fire in the stove

fry some eggs in the cast iron skillet when you get hungry
You’ll write an angsty poem or three
Try to catch a frog

You’ll be pleasantly surprised when a dragonfly lands on
the tip of your nose

This is not the kind of event that you’ve come to expect

You had intended to swim out to the island a ways away
lie in the tall grass
tempt lightning

The storm blows over and you’re left with a sunset
that turns your stomach
loons calling to each other
or to you

“channel your energy” by Sasha in her bedroom

By: Sasha 05/27/202006/02/2020

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, uneditedCOVID-19, five minutes, floor, listening, poem, poetry, seashell, sister, threads, unedited

Wednesday May 27, 2020
2:41pm
5 minutes
From a fortune cookie

I lie belly to the floor
and listen to what the voice says
beyond the tension and the toil
where the ground splits and splays

Like a seashell to the ear
the floor tells stories that
might just be blood rushing
but might be the sky underfoot

“Think about the life you want to have”
my sister says and she’s right
It’s not about a decision
It’s about the life I want to have

All the threads are spooled in the moment
of this gathering together
sure to be frayed again by morning
but for now
ear to the whitewashed wood
I’m slipping towards the eddy

“positive descriptions of the world” by Sasha in the trundle room

By: Sasha 05/24/202006/02/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesback, excuses, five minutes, paint, poem, poetry, pretending, sand, these five minutes, unedited

Sunday May 24, 2020
10:31am
5 minutes
Perceiving Ordinary Magic
Jeremy W. Hayward

Let’s go back to the time before the
anarchy and debauchery and the excuses dressed
as Big Cats

Let’s paint in sand and cello music
wrap ourselves in rhubarb leaves and moon juice
take a page out of the book of birds
and fly
and sing

There isn’t anything the matter
but everything hurts

Anyone who says otherwise
is wearing dress up clothes
musty from being in the attack
stinking of detergent
from being worn and washed

“Excluding any personal opinion” by Sasha at the dresser

By: Sasha 05/22/202005/27/2020

5 minutes, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemaliens, disease, invasion, where did this come from, wierd

Friday May 22, 2020
7:21am
5 minutes
The Death of Ivan Ilyich
Leo Tolstoy

Excellent extraterrestrial beings are congratulating their fellow friends
For the solid score of flesh eating disease on the high seas of planet earth
They’ve planted and sowed and watered and spit and shit and spat and moved
Their long fingers across the faces of the frozen zombies and they are

Goddamn delighted

That the flesh is finally falling off the bones and the frozen zombies are now
Sitting in their bathtubs filled with lentils and hairbrushes and they are
Scrubbing and scrubbing and scrubbing
The pure unadulterated extraterrestrial joy of a mission that’s been accomplished that has been in motion for millennia

“The words merely drifted” by Sasha at the table

By: Sasha 05/16/202005/22/2020

art, poem, short poem, these five minutesfive minutes, friends, sharp, unedited, words

Saturday, May 16, 2020
3:34pm
5 minutes
The Right Stuff
Tom Wolfe

Words like javilins like tennis balls
like popcorn like ice water
Drifting from my mouth to your mouth
Catch them
Venus fly traps
Catch them and swallow them
make them into new words
Words I didn’t say
Sharp
Bouncy
Catching a kernel in the throat

Words these sweet friends
turned scorned lovers turned awkward strangers

Betrayal has a jet stream that lingers
long after the word purges from tight lips

Catch this one and volley volley volley
You’ve been practising your spikes
The ball comes when I’m least expecting
Tired and stretching
BANG
First thing in the grey morning
BANG

“I bend double under its gaze,” by Sasha in her room

By: Sasha 05/11/202005/22/2020

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesfive minutes, gaze, heartbreak, lake, something good, sting, unedited

Monday, May 11, 2020
10:03pm
5 minutes
All the Room You Need
Lorna Crozier

Under this gaze
the weight of my face feels heavier than water
Air rising to the surface
Mist on the lake

I wish that I could tell you something good
Something effervescent
Hear your laugh buoyant as fireflies
But all I can muster is a bullet point report on the state

of my heartbreak
Sent in a little blue bubble
from the end of the road

Sometimes I think about looking back
on this time

What might still sting
What might create a shiver
laughter
What might be frozen
beneath

the new layer of the new thing
that’s right or wrong

“We think you’ll like it here” by Sasha at Knowlton Lake

By: Sasha 05/10/202005/22/2020

5 minutes, creative writing, five, poem, short poem, these five minutesbirds, certainty, endings, forever, letting go, nature, poetry, rocks, rollercoaster, shadow

Sunday, May 10, 2020
1:17pm
5 minutes
From an email

Shadows of birds move
across the white birch
I eclipse myself
as they do
spreading wings wide
and riding the cold wind west
I gather rocks in my pockets
carefully swiped from Lola’s mouth
Find them at the end of the day
when I undress for a bath
wondering why I am weighted
Lay them out on the windowsill
Little grey gravel pieces
I’ll return them to the road tomorrow

It’s a rollercoaster
I say over and over
Until I believe that the nausea
might be attributed to something
other than the inevitable letting go
It’s inevitable for all of us
Not just me
Letting go
Meeting our mortality
in every ending
I don’t speak in forever anymore
Scoff at those that do

There is not certainty
Anywhere but sitting with the stream
She’ll swell again next year
I can count on that
The trilliums are coming
Despite early May snow
I can count on that

“When the rains come,“ by Sasha at the dining room table

By: Sasha 05/07/202005/22/2020

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesbeginnings, denial, endings, home, judgement, metaphor, poem, poetry, sun

Thursday, May 7, 2020
2:12pm
5 minutes
Monologue of a Fly’s Shadow
Danielle Hanson

I wonder if I’ve ever felt like home to you
and if that even matters now
that we are where we are
beyond the blue horizon staring the sun in the face
Retinas recycling remembered debris
I am positing what might come next
staking ground and digging in heavy heels
What is mine now
What is yours
What is the new “ours”
Hour after hour of
Am I in denial or
Am I this okay
Am I this not okay

I wonder if you’ve ever been home to me
I certainly thought you were
But I thought a lot of things
that now feel second cousin and estranged
Living in Paris or Dubai
Wearing hand me down traumas
bright jangly jewellery dripped from neck and wrist

You say that you notice how you’re
less quick to judge
Quote something from the bible about stones
We’ve been fighting the whole car trip
the tannin of sadness thick in my mouth
staining my teeth I run my tongue along
count the smooth edges
I open the window and let the gush blast me
A bomb of maybe spring
Maybe delicacy
Hope the fresh air might change the station

“And it speaks to certain devils“ by Sasha in the trundle room

By: Sasha 05/05/202005/22/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesgood, loss, meditation., Pema Chodron, poem, relationship, suffering, walls

Tuesday, May 5, 2020
11:16am
5 minutes
Another Vision
Patricia Nelson

“We think that by protecting ourselves
from suffering we are being kind
to ourselves,” Pema writes.

Walls made of feathers and playing cards
ash and lightning
photographs and receipts

Erected with a very well scrubbed poker face
A very well stocked pantry
A very good pretending disguised as meditation

Then a flash of light and you’re
sat across from the devil
wearing the clothes of someone

You thought you knew so well
Paint a layer of nice between
two slices of bread you kneaded for many years

“between the kitchen and living room” by Sasha on the couch

By: Sasha 05/02/202005/05/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesbody, creative writing, fireworks, poem, poetry, sex

Saturday, May 2, 2020
9:43pm
5 minutes
From a text

Turn the page and find colours there in the lines and the letters
Close eyes and taste the sweet kiss of possible
Laugh in the bathtub at the ladybug crawling towards towards towards
Lola is a kindred grace her discovery of the world the tonic of rainbow

I dance to the sound I hear when I think of you
Feel the rise and fall of body on whitewashed floors
Body to body your body in my hands your hands in my body
Close my eyes and remember through tongue and fingertip

Ouija board cloud game where the ghosts are back and rolling
Light show on the lawn like the good old days when farmers
Would gather for Canada Day roast up some hotdogs and pour beer
Into jars or even drink straight from the cold can

Hang their hats on the belief that they knew what was coming
Hold their children in the arms as the sky exploded in blaze

“The cost of rural housing” by Sasha in the trundle room

By: Sasha 05/01/202005/05/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemchange, country living, five minutes, nature, rural, unedited, wildflower

Friday, May 1, 2020
11:05am
5 minutes
Life After the City
Charles Long

So being here with the robins and the apple blossoms
the sloping fields and the red winged black birds

the swamp and the cedar forest and
the big chest freezer and the turning garden

I think about rural living and how good
it feels to wear the same fleecy six days in a row

And add a log to the wood stove
while the girls make a “show”

Wildflower heart blooms ripe
I catch my own eye while brushing my teeth

And see someone new
Someone who I didn’t know I needed

Didn’t know I missed

“Higher!” By Sasha at the kitchen table

By: Sasha 04/27/202004/28/2020

5 minutes, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poembusy, COVID-19, fear, five minutes, poem, poetry, Skype, these five minutes, unedited

Monday April 27, 2020
9:22pm
5 minutes
Higher Higher
Leslie Patticelli

When the sound of the rain is louder than the sound of your breath
In your own ear leaving you closer to where you thought the pepper might be
Sneeze up and sneeze down and dream of the world that might bloom from this strange chrysalis of change and quiet

Maybe the busiest of the busy with the lists that run out like toilet paper from the bottom of the fancyfancy shoes
Maybe these people will learn to breathe in one nostril and out the other
Sprout cucumbers and raspberries in small pots

Maybe the scared ones the ones who keep their doors double locked and would rather see their strange Auntie on Skype than at the tea shop
Will feel like they finally belong on the planet that never really told them that they were wanted and that they were precision and that they were free

“After I hung up on him” by Sasha in the bedroom

By: Sasha 04/26/202004/27/2020

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemCOVID-19, five minutes, nature, phone call, poem, poetry, quarantine, river, these five minutes, unedited

Sunday April 26, 2020
10:03pm
5 minutes
Facts About Dead Trees
Lisa Baird

I hung up the phone
Didn’t hang up on
But did hang up
Pressed the red button
Was something strange
in the static
in the quiet
in the pandemic
“what even is this anymore”?

I kicked a piece of gravel
called “Why?!”
to a turkey vulture
who glides where
perspective is silky
where I am the rightful size

The sun stoops
to touch my chest

Right in the rise
where love’s hand goes
Feeling breath
Feeling life
Feeling “yes”
and “no”

Hours turn to days
and the cedar forest turns
bark to promise

A promise of black flies
zucchini hot from the sun
The river rising and rushing

Guiding me back

“find the right question” by Sasha at Knowlton Lake

By: Sasha 04/21/202004/26/2020

creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, writing practiseCOVID-19, five minutes, normal, poetry, quarantine, Song, these five minutes, unedited

Tuesday April 21, 2020
7:36am
5 minutes
quoting Ann Hamilton

If there was any doubt
Things aren’t going back to normal
What was normal anyway?
Bits of hair in the hairbrush
A half rolled cigarette on the table
Wine in the cupboard above the sink
Wind in the veins

I am not going where I thought I was
Neither is he
Neither are you
The robin’s are here though
With their red bellies and worms in their beaks

I hear the same song in the stillness
The one where the start is small and the rise is like the rapids

Normal for me was the tea steeping in the morning and the little sticky fingers
Walking to the fruit market to get scallions cilantro and lime

Normal for me was the quiet ending to the day
Hands open lying face up
Counting blessings
Like stars

“Whoa, I was toasted” by Sasha at Knowlton Lake

By: these five minutes 04/03/2020

5 minutes, art, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesbaby, five minutes, growth, kiss, kissing, Knowlton Lake, Lola, love, motherhood, unedited

Friday April 3, 2020
12:33pm
5 minutes
Ode to American English
Barbara Crooker

Lola kisses my belly in the bath over and over
“Your old house!” I say the first few times
she keeps going and I stop talking or pepper a “thank you”
a “thank you, my love”
her cherubic shape all convex freedom beauty
four top teeth commander
a wrinkled nose smile
Lola kisses the stairs she’s just learned to climb

a few tumbles when she’s wearing her brown bobbly slippers
when she test the limits of her strength
her capability brings her boundless glee

so much so that as she races towards my outstretched arms
stepping stepping step step step
She falls
a look of
“how could I?”
I wait a long wait
feels long
Will the tears come?
If they do
I scoop up under her armpits with my hands
Feel my mother’s hands in my armpits
Tempering and soothing so many falls

“You fell” I say
“Let’s keep walking”

Lick a tear from her cheek
a juicy plum
Smell her hair
orange and soap

Lola kisses the baby doll
sinks her teeth into the plastic foot
“Bee-bee! Bee-bee!”
She calls for her father in the morning
with a voice bigger than I’ve ever heard her have
When did she become this mystery concerto?

“Da-da?! Da-da! Da-da?!”
“Lo-la!” He calls back
“Hi honey!” He says

“He can fix anything” by Sasha at Knowlton Lake

By: Sasha 03/31/202004/03/2020

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesdeath, five minutes, fixer, grief, loss, palliative care, toilets, unedited

Tuesday March 31, 2020
9:37pm
5 minutes
Easter Morning
Jim Harrison

You strike me as the kind of person who can fix anything
Who knows how to wire a telephone jack and level a table
Someone who could look at a hanging shelf in the box
On the floor
And know how to
Get it up on the wall
Without too much sweat or stress or swear words

If the toilet were to become leaky
I imagine that you would jingle thingle this
And wiggle spaggle that and
The leak would be gone
The flush would be full throttle
All would be well again
In the world of whisking away waste
What we do not want to see
What we’d rather be gone

I’d call Lou when I couldn’t get my
Backup hard drive to listen to my computer
He walked me through that whole
Ring-a-round-the-Rosie
Several times
Always patient
Always steady
I’d feel a bit badly to be troubling him
But also a bit good to have a reason
To need him
To need his expertise
To need his help

When he was in Palliative Care
He called me once
Very late at night
Late for me
And that was with the three hour time difference
Ahead in Vancouver
He told me about a piece of music
He’d been listening to
I wish I remembered what it was
I’d listen to it now
How he was waiting on tracks to be mixed
For his album
He told me that he was tired
And laughed when I told him
“I love you”

“They’ll be able to describe it” by Sasha at Knowlton Lake

By: Sasha 03/24/202003/25/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemCOVID-19, family, five minutes, limbo, mourn, non fiction, pandemic, pandemic poetry, unedited, weeks

Tuesday March 24, 2020
10:49pm
5 minutes
Teaching a Child the Art of Confession
David Shumate

We will be able to describe these strange limbo weeks
one day
In the future
When things are (aren’t) back to normal

My father says that the data shows that after a big event
People want things to return to how they were
They don’t want change
They want their coffee back
Their subway to the office back
Their Tuesday game night back

On the radio today
The broadcaster says that the funeral homes in Italy
Can’t keep up with the bodies
They are sending them to an ice rink
I gasp
No one can gather to mourn
so priests are holding rites online
But many seniors don’t have the Internet

From the corner of the back deck where I get reception
I speak to my sister
A world away
Three hours away
In the city

She says that they’ve run out of some fruit
some greens
And won’t be able to get stuff delivered until Friday

I make a mental note to update our inventory spreadsheet
Today we ate four eggs
Kale stalks
Green onions
Cilantro
Three pieces of bread
Avocado
Millet
Corn
One can of black beans
Dried mango
I must be forgetting something

The call keeps cutting out so I find myself
shouting into the melting birch forest
“I can’t stop thinking about that the babies and kids are safe!”
Something barks or howls in the distance
I turn around to look

“The spring is compressed” by Sasha at Knowlton Lake

By: Sasha 03/20/202003/25/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesCOVID-19, nature, pandemic poetry, poetry, Ticks

Friday March 20, 2020
10:08pm
5 minutes
A Brief Lecture on Door Closers
Clemens Starck

The spring is coming
This is optimism in the shape of buds on the pinky’s of trees
temptation of the thaw in my chest as I flirt with a step on yawning ice

The pussywillows sway as the phoebes sing
Sun speaking a brave prayer as she opens her mouth wide
This is the light that encircles us all

I unpack weeks worth of groceries into the droning fridge
Spinach and oranges
Apples and cheddar cheese
Bread and half a mango
Tofu and a jar of red lentil soup from the freezer back home

Nadeem starts a fire in the wood stove
The roar catching in my heart as it lets down
As it feels the quiet in ventricles and chasms

Mom sent an email about ticks
And how we shouldn’t go walking in the woods or let
Lola crawl in the tall grass

Especially as it gets warmer
Trading vigilances
Swapping one worry for another

This is the light that encircles us all

“You will be very welcome” by Sasha on the comfy chair

By: Sasha 03/15/202003/18/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minuteshappy birthday, nature, nature worship, poem, poetry, sunset, you

Sunday March 15, 2020
1:43pm
5 minutes
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
L. Frank Baum

You will take yourself to the quiet of the centre of the forest.
You will tell yourself that you’re sorry for all the times you betrayed the quiet knowing in the space below your heart, the space around your heart, the pearl in the cavern of your heart.
You will drink from the well where your mother drank when she was ripping stickers from the life she thought she’d sewed. We never know. We really never know.

You will wait for dusk and greet him with a kiss.
You will paint your face with the colours of the sunset, relish in the dusty pink and cool grey.
Wink the happy birthday song, even though it isn’t your birthday, but it will be, and why not.

“Supposing the force of gravity in any similar medium” by Sasha at her kitchen table

By: Sasha 03/11/202003/14/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutescoronavirus, COVID-19, fear, five minutes, hand wash, heart, poem, poetry, unedited

Wednesday March 11, 2020
10:35am
5 minutes
Newton’s Principia: The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy
Sir Isaac Newton

The force of two hands pushing against each other
the friction of opposing desires colliding in the space between voices
shouting
The quiet of lust
The staccato of fear as it snakes and shimmies through the waterways
of the city
the country
the continent
the world

A daffodil sits on my kitchen table having opened overnight
How did she do it?
The light through the stained glass window
Lola eating a circle of banana
and then scrunching her nose as she smiles
Salve on my scared heart

What does your scared heart
tell you as you wash your hands?
Those twenty seconds of suds and warmth
a chasm between the possible panic
or possible breath
or possible love sent out to
the lonely
the vulnerable
the sick
the grieving
the ones who plug their ears and
pop their bottles

My scared heart tells me that
this is a time for slowing down
For phone calls and hot baths
and warm water in blue mugs

My scared heart tells me
it was only a matter of time
It is only a matter of time

“It is never too late” by Sasha on her living room floor

By: Sasha 03/07/202003/10/2020

5 minutes, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesbath, five minutes, heart, love, share, unedited, write

Saturday March 7, 2020
7:40am
5 minutes
Quote by George Elliot

It is never too late to change your mind
I write this in the bottom margin of my journal page
over and over again
a call to myself from a pay phone on the side of a
strange highway
driving fast
the trees turn into a thick brush painting

day after day I write

It is never too late to change your mind

and sometimes I think that I’m not writing
it for myself or
I’m not only writing it for myself

I’m writing it for you

like drawing a hot bath
dripping in six drops of eucalyptus
three drops of lavender
a quarter cup epsom salts
the perfect gift

My horoscope said to write it all down
if I want it to happen

That’s what I do here

Write and share and
wonder what dear heart
might be reading
these tired words
these lazy wonderings
these pen carvings
fingertip songs

It is never too late to change your mind

“I can’t tell you” by Sasha on her couch

By: Sasha 03/02/202003/07/2020

5 minutes, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, writing, writing practise, writing projectfingers, five minutes, him, language, poetry, these five minutes, unedited

Monday March 2, 2020
11:09am
5 minutes
For my friend who told me don’t celebrate the dead
Andrea Potos

I can’t tell you of the gulf between the dream and the dream
where the tide mixes with the blood and the maybes and the almosts
A new language born of how we build our own pipe cleaner world
How is the imperative
That’s what no one tells you

I saw him roll the possibility between his fingers
the hair of a forgotten song
turn it over and over
until it didn’t baffle with the same enthusiasm
That is how the dove sings to the reflection of herself
in the birdbath
in the garden

I saw him leave the body of light on the side of the road
tumbleweeds and stray cats circle
Pisces season

“I don’t make jokes.” By Sasha at her kitchen table

By: Sasha 02/28/202003/03/2020

love poem, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesbasement apartment, disappointment, face, feelings, five minutes, missing, unedited

Friday February 28, 2020
7:19am
5 minutes
From a quote by Will Rogers

Disappointment leaves wax on my favourite cashmere sweater
add it to the pile of things I need to Google to figure out

I sat with myself last night on the red couch in the basement apartment
closed my eyes and leaned back and said

”Why?!” It was very soap opera dramatic and alto whiney
so then I laughed at myself and what strange creatures we all really are

I unpack the bag of the things that I had packed carefully
Napkins and a yellow lighter and a small jar of butter to which

I’d added flaky salt
It’s a foreign city I’ve found myself in

Familiar house but foreign city
Missing a feeling missing a face missing a feeling of a face

“The stunning couple” by Sasha in the living room chair

By: Sasha 02/22/202002/26/2020

5 minutes, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, writing projectcouple, fury, look, love

Saturday February 22, 2020
11:53am
5 minutes
The Tree Sparrows
Joseph O. Legaspi

Comes in swearing and shaking
hollering and quaking and they are off
Stunning before they bust through the walls
Laughing and then what’s the other side of the coin
Fighting and then tales
You’re it
Fucking and then
Heads

it’s better in their imaginations
it’s better in real life
it’s better when they’ve drunk half a bottle
swallowed half a bottle
Don’t turn the light on
Don’t see the scars

Peacock feather dreams
A path they used to walk at the beginning
Before it all got blender spun
Favourite sweater out of the dryer
Shrunk to a shape that squeezes
asks too much

Stunning the other with their cuss words
and love moves the sound of a voice
pitter patter
waterfall
raging fury of fire
Mmhmm

They are off

“like being naked with someone you haven’t been naked with” by Sasha on the plane

By: Sasha 02/16/202002/17/2020

love poem, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemfish, five minutes, irony, lies, one-liners, poem, poetry, tenderness, trust, unedited

Sunday February 16, 2020
11:11am
5 minutes
Hot Pulse
J. Jill Robinson

Trust is a slippery fish that wriggles out of hands back into lake water
swims down to where the seaweed opens and closes
Finds a small “o” and swallows it and burps bubbles up
Face pressed against the float
breathe in the small pockets of air
upturn or downturn
Will he or won’t he break my tired heart?

The scales change colour and flake off
The mind says
This is always how it goes
Exhausted tune that the ears don’t even hear anymore
it’s so embedded and cozy in a down duvet
heavy limbs finally resting like they haven’t since
Before

Throw the line in far and fast
loaded the end of the rod with the finest bait
wide eyes
freshly sharpened wit
tears like seeds that sow
connection
some very strong one liners
playing with messy hands messy hair
looking down and then up and then down again
a promise collected on eyelashes
volleying and rolling and diving
with each
blink

The fish comes up to the surface and sucks on toes
Three times the size that she was before
Don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing
Deep throat
Gills ablaze
Tail tracing the shape of the timing
Folding irony over tenderness
kneading a dough of the very becoming

that births a perfect risk

“a performance of about two and a half hours” by Sasha on the couch

By: Sasha 02/11/202002/13/2020

5 minutes, art, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemdaring, making decisions, noisy, poetry, unedited, unknown, you

Tuesday February 11, 2020
10:02pm
5 minutes
Nibelung
Devon Code

Before you know the tension of this radical Wild West town
Grazed in it’s fire pastures and danced the waltz to the jingly piano songs
Raised a glass to your lover and their lover and the lover of the lover who doesn’t know their own loss of sight
(We hold him with stiff arms and narrate the colours and the faces as best we can)

Before you allow yourself to make up your mind about all of this
About me
(Strange speckles on my pants and hair messy and unwashed
A smirk of faith like peanut butter across my lips)
Ride a mare into the forest and see what the trees have to say
They are quiet today?
Listen from the place that you used to listen from before you had your heart broken
Listen from the place where children gasp and clap and cry
What do they have to tell you, dear heart?
Root systems feeling and telling and feeling the generational longitude and latitude
Braiding beliefs and twisting whatever it is your pearl of truth is

It’s noisy in the wrongdoing and rightdoing
It’s noisy where we clash and bang because none of us knows what the fuck we are doing
It’s noisy but we strain we stress we strain to hear the wisdom
in the way breath is when it’s still between us
when it’s night and the snow is starting
and the streetcar tumbles onward

“They should not be ordinary words” by Sasha in the kitchen

By: Sasha 02/10/202002/13/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemfive minutes, poem, poetry, right, self acceptance, tired, trying, unedited, Writing

Monday February 10, 2020
9:21pm
5 minutes
What’s in a Name
Moez Surani

Try harder try better try more more more
Lift taller stand braver and quiet with the door
Go faster now slow down can you just simply “be”
Relaxxxx everything’s fine this isn’t about me

Self acceptance daring greatly breathe really deep
Laughter therapy let it out weep weep weep
Stay humble stay grounded stay open and free
Release your anger get present get happpppy

It’s okay that you’re scared and lonely and mad
It’s okay that you’re curious confused and sad
It’s okay that you’re unsure tired and tight
Release your jaw but there really isn’t a “right”

“The letter should be read out loud” by Sasha in front of the fire

By: Sasha 02/07/202002/07/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesbaby, cards, five minutes, motherhood, rain, tired, trees, unedited

Friday February 7, 2020
10:15pm
5 minutes
Anger, Boundaries & Safety
Joann S. Peterson

I buy two cards
the same cards
at the bougie shop
that I hate to love

It’s these firsts
that make me smile
gasp
yawn
I’m tired of myself

I’ve run back and forth
to Lola several times tonight

her rosebud mouth finding
my rosebud nipple
matching puzzle
the gurgles and gasps
tiny snores and reaches
I stroke her soft hair
and wonder what I could’ve
possibly done in this life
or the last one
to deserve such grace

I walk in the rain
trudging the same daily path
a ritual of cold fingers
chapped lips
lilting toes
breath a drum
cedars touching heaven
roots touching mine

“If the leaf stem is long” by Sasha on the couch

By: Sasha 02/06/202002/07/2020

5 minutes, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemcolour, friendship, planning, poem, poetry, spring

Thursday February 6, 2020
9:43pm
5 minutes
Tree Finder
May Theilgaard Watts

I will pick you flowers and weave the stems together
and make something beautiful something like you’ve never seen
so many colours come with spring
so many colours come with friendship
between two people
who have lived a lot of life
in colour
in friendship
in the backpack of April and May
so many things happen
when we’re planning other things

I’ll always see you as I met you
a different version of who you are
but the crass and the soft and the savage
all there still
and now
all there because you’ve needed them each
desperately
survival of the beautiful
survival of the innocent

“Trust the face of expansion” by Sasha on the living room floor

By: Sasha 02/05/202002/07/2020

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemfiction, five minutes, gas station, poem, signs, trust, unedited

Wednesday February 5, 2020
10:22pm
5 minutes
The Power Of Intention
Dr. Wayne W. Dyer

Trust the face of expansion
Trust the open mouth of a new way portal taking you
back to yourself
back to the archangel who brought your spirit into
physical form
who told you riddle and
stuck a finger in your ear
and made you laugh until
you’re teeth ached like
ice cream
and chalkboards

Trust the signs
on the carpet in the strange hotel
that smells like bubble gum and has a rooftop
pool open all hours where no one has ever drowned
where you drink the mini bar pre mixed cocktails
and eat the small packet of nuts
and consider masturbation
but braid your hair instead

Trust the gas station attendant
who tells you to never chase a tornado
who gives you the best beef jerky you’ve ever had
who runs your credit card three times
and each time it’s declined
winks as though someone
might have your back

“You can see my baby’s heartbeat” by Sasha at JJ Bean on Cambie

By: Sasha 01/29/202001/29/2020

5 minutes, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutesbaby, daughter, heartbeat, motherhood, parenthood, pee, true story, ultrasound

Wednesday January 29, 2020

11:33am
5 minutes

The Kingdom of God

Teddy Macker

I meet your heartbeat when I meet my own
hands on swollen belly
twenty weeks
twenty weeks of you

I shriek the whole way to the lab
I have to pee so bad
And your dad goes over speedbumps slowly
takes turns slowly
I scream
He tries to curb his laughter

My heart was racing in a way
I’d never known
Knowing you were there
but also doubting
I don’t do that anymore
When I know I know
You teach me that

”It’s your first” the technician says
and I nod and she says she always knows
Let’s me pee half way
Smiles
Having seen it all before

Tears on my cheeks as I meet your black and white image
on the screen
I know you in the ancient way that feet know ground
I know your sweetness
your grace
your eyebrow raise
knowing smile

Lola Moon
Nine months old
My life’s greatest joy
is being your mother
My life’s greatest work
is doing well by you
and failing you
and doing well by you again

“This is a test broadcast” by Sasha in her living room

By: Sasha 01/13/202001/16/2020

5 minutes, love poem, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutespoem, poetry, unedited, you

Monday January 13, 2020
7:38am
5 minutes
from a text

I watch a grey squirrel scale a pillar that holds the house up
Ponder the swelling heart in my chest but not with my mind

with my fingers massaging the sinew between the ribs that
hold the quaking strange thing

think about the taste of your body peppery on my tongue
and when will it feel familiar when will it no longer feel so new

I used to count my blessings before bed
list ten things I was grateful for

but now I do it throughout the day
close my eyes and send gratefulness up to the clouds

and down to the roots
You are all ten things today

“The insufferable arrogance of humanity” by Sasha on her couch

By: Sasha 01/10/202001/13/2020

5 minutes, creative writing, fiction, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, writingbeginning, fiction, remember, you

Friday January 10, 2020
8:01am
5 minutes
Big Picture
A. Whitney Brown

Remember when I looked you in the eye and told you you were everything? Remember when I looked you in the eye and told you you were everything I wanted?Forget about a book deal forget about a play on a big stage with lots of eyes on it forget about a bakery, a restaurant, a food truck, sharing the nourishment of my heart with the world. Forget about activism and radio shows. Forget about a yard full of chickens and kids. Forget about all of that because you, you are the pearl at the top of the mountain buried in the moss and ice found with fingers that know the way home. Remember when I looked you in the eye and told you I was leaving because you being everything isn’t enough. You being everything is only the beginning but it’s not the end and the end is here and that is it’s own pregnant beginning. Funny how things unravel when you think you know.

“Brought their wives and children” by Sasha at Black River Farm

By: Sasha 01/01/202001/03/2020

5 minutes, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, writing, writing practise, writing projectdystopia, the future

Wednesday January 1, 2020
8:00am
5 minutes
The Trial of Louis Riel
George R.D. Goulet

It’s a place beyond the edge of the concrete
the layers that will remain when
we’re all dead and gone
when something new is here
something no one knows is coming

It’s a place made of wires and rope
boulders and blocks
pipes and fallen electrical lines
Siding and bits of boats and planes

Children play on old car seats
telling each other stories from the time
before the Place was a place
blowing kisses to the ghost birds
that fly overhead in the black sky

Adults skip rocks over gasoline pools
pry water from pockets between the concrete
speak quietly of where they might find more food
Look to their young for hope when it fades
from their tired hearts
scrape muck from the bottoms of their boots
only to collect more and then scrape
and then more and then scrape

“I would like to say, in closing,” by Sasha at Black River Farm

By: Sasha 12/30/201912/31/2019

5 minutes, five, poem, short poem, these five minutes2020, decade, mountains, ocean, poem, return, thank you

Monday December 30, 2019
9:03pm
5 minutes
Malcolm X Speaks
Selected speeches and statements

I would like to say thank you to all the love spent and found,
returned and exchanged, felt and grieved, tossed and held.
I would like to say “yes” to all feeling feeling feeling feeling,
the tidal waves crashing over what I thought might happen,
how I thought I wanted things to go. God laughs the warm
sun laugh of a knowing wisdom, a brightness beyond bright.

It’s been a decade of learning through doing, of leaving and
finding, of searching and twisting, of laughing laughing laughing.
Thousands of miles lived in the palm of my hand, in the ache
of my heart broken (open), steps stepped across the desert
of longing, no matter how much abundance reigns (rains).

The mountains taught me about gravity, about letting go,
about touching the clouds, but not imaging that we ever
truly know their texture and their pull. The ocean taught
me about ebb and flow, about vulnerability and strength,
about the goodness and truth of salt water, of being washed,
return return return return.

“They did almost everything wrong” by Sasha at her kitchen counter

By: Sasha 12/29/201912/31/2019

5 minutes, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesbones, five minutes, house, kiss, poem, unedited

Sunday December 29, 2019
12:13pm
5 minutes
The Body
Bill Bryson

trapped beneath the floorboards
amidst mouse droppings and dust
mildew and

the secrets of socked feet

bare feet
treading heavy
treading light

morning feet in slippers
shuffling in slippers
with worn soles

dancing to Bruce Springsteen
Massive Attack
Kanye West
feet that know the tune
know the rhythm
know the rhyme

feet that rage and kick
toddler feet and father feet
the language of the toes
the vocabulary of a flex
a pop
a crunch

the bones of this house
have seen love sprout like dandelions
yellow and awake
the femur of this foundation
words in the ground below
stories in the veins
coursing towards
coursing away

A breath in the sigh
of winter
the lights turned off
the night kisses
pursed sleeping lips

“They all would be knocking back a few” by Sasha in her living room

By: Sasha 12/28/201912/31/2019

5 minutes, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemalcohol, birds, booze, creative writing, unedited

Saturday December 28, 2019
3:43pm
5 minutes
The Right Stuff
Tom Wolfe

These months I find the soft liquid
goes down easy doesn’t require anything
but an open throat

Takes the edge off you say and I agree
all curves through no edge but in the
catch in the
throat

I had to hold tight to the rules that I’d written
we all do right
It wasn’t just me?

But now that the gooey centre is on the outside
spread between fingers and in the bellybutton
I find my hands
heart
open instead of closed

These months I savour the sweet burn
sat on the grey couch under the window
where the birds roost and leave
roost and leave

their red necks
craning back as we watch

“You can do the job when you’re in town” By Sasha on her couch

By: Sasha 12/26/201912/24/2019

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutesvulnerability

Thursday December 26, 2019

10:29am

5 minutes

Walking In A Winter Wonderland

You’ve got your heart on your sleeve again
I want it in your chest
nestled where it belongs

beside walls and blood
contained and safe

away from the traffic and mouths

I don’t know why the naked truth of it
scares me
Maybe it’s because I’m still not sure about
all of this this this
this tender
this spicy

this open wonder
open wound
here’s a feeling that hasn’t been felt
in a very long time

Maybe it always has
the Humpty Dumpty possibility
seeing it right there in arm’s reach
in another
Easier to keep distance than
the inward turn

Brene says that vulnerability
is courage and I know this
to be true but still the very
rawness the very smell of
bone is enough to
send me running

“The first was of Saint Gabriel” by Sasha at Bowmore

By: Sasha 12/14/201912/19/2019

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutescandles, dinner, Rumi, saints

Saturday December 14, 2019
10:06pm
5 minutes
Courtesy
Hilaire Belloc

I write out the names of my guests in cursive
the penmanship I earned
fingers tattooed with black ink
a fountain pen spilling forth
the dreams of the daughters of Juniper

I write Hildegard
sing to the stars that don’t show their faces
in summer and glow only when it’s cold
I write Gabriel
messenger and mover
guiding and lifting up that which is weighted
that which is torn
I write Rumi
A true love I’ve never met
my favourite kind
mystic and healer
I write Maya
caged bird released
landing on the branches of the olive tree

I light the candles one by one
with the purple lighter I found in a puddle
ran my thumb over the rough edge
and gasped at the flame

“Something continues and” by Sasha in her living room

By: Sasha 12/11/201912/15/2019

fiction, poem, short poem, these five minutes

Wednesday December 11, 2019
9:14am
A Birthday
W.S. Merwin

My mother washes leeks in a filled kitchen sink
Roasts rainbow carrots in coconut oil with cumin seeds
She wipes the counter with diligence and attention
wringing out the cloth
fresh water

The kitchen is filled with winter light
the brightness of these generations gathered
My father is upstairs at his desk
crunching almonds
unsure about these two women who are so close
unsure of where he belongs in the puzzle
are there two pieces or three

I come on Sundays to be with them
their only child
they wanted me so desperately they paid thousands
to make sure I was born with their
ears and eye colour and sense of humour

My Mom was almost forty when she finally conceived
eight miscarriages over six years
“Don’t wait” she says now when I say
I think I might actually want kids after all
”Don’t wait”

My father comes down and we are laughing
I’m picking the good bits of crunchy skin off the chicken

“since I let myself think about” by Sasha in the bath

By: Sasha 12/01/201912/02/2019

poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemsharks

Sunday December 1, 2019

10:31pm

5 minutes

I Never Liked Your Friends

Alexandria Maillot

Sharks swim in the water in the place where I live

circling and hoping for fearless playmates
oh the sweet innocent oh the venom toed hope
of any variety of any shape of any texture of any taste

I can’t believe that I’ve jumped in again
swirling towards chaos or the rush of being desired
I don’t even know what it all looks like anymore

I hate how heartbreak has made me better
in every sense of the word
the b touches the e with softness and smoke
the two t’s are lovers that no one knows about
the e and the r parents to a new thing that has

never been born before
I hate how heartbreak looks good on me most days
and the jeans fit just so now
just so I can remember the time before the time
the time before the second hand caught up
the time before time

I ride the shark into the black and blue
the coral reef glows fluorescent
tension expels herself from my form
I am oh
I am oh
I am oh

“It begins from the heart.” By Sasha at Black River Farm

Sunday October 13, 2019
10:00am
5 minutes
From a quote by Shahla Khan

Here is the place where we held hands and hearts
where we wove futures and past and incanted the unborn
and the dead

Here is the place where we passed rings around a circle of song
taught in front of the wood stove
harmonies bending air between mouths of all the beloved ones
asked for witnesses in keeping us on the spiral path
mystery and possibility
leading us

Here

is the place where the sky was the blue of my father’s eyes
the earth the colour of home
a tent like a shady dream
we didn’t know we needed
the smell of goodness and grief
hope and healing
all the hours of dreaming
fighting scrawling spreadsheet poetry

Here is the place
where you climbed onto a horse’s back
the way you knew you needed to
her ribs leading you towards
the rhythm of your palms
on my chest
feeling the rise
the fall

Here is the place
that I’ve summoned
these long weeks
called up in my storm
like a lighthouse
held close when there
was nothing

this place
an eternal reminder
of the blessing
of a union marked in the stars
marked on the map of

This place

“We did all these things and more,” By Sasha at her kitchen table

Friday, Oct 11, 2019

7:28am

5 minutes

We Did

Brian Doyle

There were the seasons of planting the seeds

of good fortune and picking out the rocks from the

supple generous earth

sticky resilience

honey under fingernails

dirt on cheeks

There were phases of freezing toes
and shouting under a starless sky

Crescent moon asking for more more

more more more when she finally came

when she finally helped

New like the baby’s first glance

like the promise of spring

deep freeze full of bones and secrets

thought there was nothing left to say

but there always is

wisdom a crystal buried in the basement

growing every day

There were years of abundance

years of bushels of apples

sweet potato pies

rye bread in the oven

trading this for that

no need to pass bills between

trusted treasures

There were summers of black flies

zucchini’s the size of toddlers

lake swims and fires

snaking smoke to the

Seven Sisters

birch bark friendship bracelets

girls laughing

“I can’t help but reflect” by Sasha in her comfy chair

Sunday October 6, 2019
7:12am
5 minutes
from an email

You are looking everywhere for signs
Under the sink between the garbage bin and the compost pail
In the sky amongst the light pollution and almost there Milky Way
In the numbers on the houses where we live

The numbers of the clock when you think to look
The things we say
or don’t say
Numbers numbers numbers so many numbers
But it doesn’t add up
or if there’s a division
it’s hollow and stale

It’s become an obsession
this sign hunting
Your inner compass a rudder that you no longer trust
It’s lead you astray before but this time
things matter in a different kind of way

I humour your hunting
I nod when you tell me of something or other
I like signs too
But I don’t hold to them as the gospel
Clinging to the spindly tree in the middle of a hurricane
I don’t believe that they are the only marker
of progress
of love
of resonance

“This week just got ducking crazy” by Sasha in her kitchen

Friday October 4, 2019
8:21am
5 minutes
From a text message

Hello Friday
Tired eyes and hangnails ablaze
Hello end of the week
but does that really matter
now that each day has a similar

different shape
kaleidoscopic Tuesday Wednesday Thursday
and here we are

Hello Friday
Coffee breath and dirty diapers
Laundry forgotten in the machine
stinks of what could have been
freshness
Oh well
Crumbs from last night’s toast
on the counter
A mouse turd under the fridge
Oh well

Hello Friday
labors into the weekend
a good time an inch away
a good time here now
Oh
kay
The prospect of a good beat
a piece of nice cheese
baby laughter
It’s here
All of it
It’s here

Hello Friday
You’ve got your nice party pants on
Mmm hmm
you’re looking fiiiine

“in search of a taxi” by Sasha at her kitchen table

Monday September 30, 2019
9:38am
5 minutes
The Rage
Gene Kerrigan

I am calling up into the sky
magenta and teal
for a sign
a lightning bolt
a monarch across the freckles of the morning

this is the right thing
the bullseye arrow right to the
rose quartz
oh good grief

I’m doing the good good work
trimming the brush back
finding the path towards

Pele told me a long time ago
in the early morning
walking on lava
and seeing where the earth
opens pulses gasps

that I would be one of the ones
who has to find the diamond
carved by pressure
etched by time
strengthened by temperature
and pushing

“He straightened up, roaring” by Sasha at her kitchen table

Friday September 27, 2019
9:41pm
5 minutes
Surface Detail
Iain M. Banks

His strange hurting is not mine to hold alone now
one way of building the house brick by brick
choosing the funny and misshapen ones
the burnt ones choosing the faceless and the wild
When I first met him I felt his way and I didn’t like it
Too much too close to leery to curious too much too much
I am a softer kind of animal
When I met him for the second time I did like it
I was ready for the rumble then around that long table
ready for the way these waves would crash against
the side of reality and wish and trust and begin again

Now meeting him for the millionth time
my mind still isn’t made up and maybe it isn’t about the mind
maybe it isn’t even about the heart
a five letter word overused to the point of letting the blood out
maybe it is about the guts that circle around the centre of the body
the body knows the body doesn’t forget the body keeps a tally
of all the doings and undoings

Earthquake comes when we are least expecting
we are not the choosers of the timing of the bricks turning
to sand turning to ash turning to memory

“The pulsating life force energy in such children” by Sasha at her kitchen table

Wednesday September 25, 2019
9:10pm
5 minutes
The Relationship Garden
Jock McKeen & Bennet Wong

Oh you
finding the timbre of your voice
the waterfall from
high to low
cascade down and
oh we are in raspberries
fields and fields of
pursed lips
emphatic cough
bumblebee giggle

the strength of your miracle

body
I am in awe of
how you kick legs
curl toes
grab with the power
of a herd of buffalo
propel forward
and back
forward

right to the edge

Oh you
five months old today
thigh rolls and curiosity
squeals of blessing
holding the gaze of
your grandparents
and strangers
holding the fingers
of love

clutching and growing
learning about the many
faces

of beauty

“Your arms would eventually tire” by Sasha at the dining room table

Tuesday September 24, 2019
8:10am
5 minutes
The Purpose Driven Life
Rick Warren

You’re done with the holding of the sun
and the moon

The Milky Way galaxy
dotting the path towards
forgiveness and understanding

You’re done
Your arms are tired and the light
of these celestial orbs is blinding
so up close so luminous

There’s been lots of talk
of choice
of feelings
of love
There’s been so much talk

Here’s what I’ve come to

maybe

We don’t choose our feelings
but we choose what we do with them

Do we flock to the ember
that whispers our name
in a voice that’s unknowns
and possibilities
Over there across the road
the horses buck and cry

Do we fan the flame
of knowing ourselves
in the way we wish to know

the other

in the way we wish
to be held in the glow
of the night sky

“I am weak willed when I want to be” by Sasha at the dining room table

Monday September 23, 2019
11:36am
5 minutes
The Doctor and the Soul
Dr. Victor E. Frankl

I am a weak willed wildebeest when I want to be
I will cave under the smallest pressure
under the legs of an unassuming ant
pressing downwards downwards
downwards towards the middle

I am the tallest turning trombone when I want to be
I will reach for the treetops
touch the cloud bellies
make a sound that the small bird flying
up above the rest hears and
she laughs laughs laughs

I am a contagious celebrator cuttlefish when I want to be
I will blow every horn and fill the balloons to the brim
dance a jig on the hour every hour
repeating the names of all the good cuttlefish
all the holy schools
repeating gratitude from the ground to the tip

“The person we think we are” By Sasha in the backyard

By: Sasha 09/22/2019

5 minutes, love poem, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poemacorn, door, fingerprints, five minutes, liquid, these five minutes, unedited, you

Sunday September 22, 2019
9:46am
5 minutes
The Art of Purposeful Being”
Philip Winkelmans MA

It’s okay that things end up different
than we imagined and that the

way is feels is liquid and leaning forwards and back
Fingerprints of sticky hearts and winding maybes
lead a path towards the little house by the maple and fir
I knock on the door

thinking that you’re in there
writing in a pen you’ve whittled since before we met

I knock on the door

and it opens a little
a mound of sand my toes could get used to
an acorn drops
time stops with the thud of thunder and sleep

Someone is sitting on the floor in the corner
eyes closed
Three geese fly overhead in the perfect “V”
that represents all holy trinities

Is it prayer?
Is it contemplation?
Is it remembering?

It isn’t you
I know that most certainly
They don’t have your fireworks or your
steady breath

“But in a poem we can do anything we want.” By Sasha at the dining room table

Friday, September 20, 2019

3:41pm

5 minutes

Since You Asked

Lawrence Raab

She thinks before she speaks
a practise she tries on before bed
washing her face and the day away
brushing her teeth
“I think before I speak” she spits
the bubbles down the drain
a small “c” of blood

turns to “j”
turns to “L”

She tries to listen with open ears
but often she finds herself
thinking thinking thinking thinking
”Sorry what did you say?”
What happens when she really hears
what he or he or she or they are saying?

”I listen with open ears” a mantra
on her breath
maybe if she says it enough
it will be true
it will be born

it will be as real as the

hangnail on her left ring finger

The path of the virtuous

Oh the weight of striving

She thinks before she speaks

She listens with open ears

She knows the joy and the suffering

of loving and being loved and

losing and being lost

and leaving and having left

and breathing into the heart

of the sound of what it is

to not know very much at all

“Today, they target” by Sasha at the dining room table on Oak Dr.

Wednesday September 18, 2019
7:12am
5 minutes
Snapshot of a Lump
Kelli Russell Agodon

I didn’t think I’d be sat in the suburban dream
with manicured front lawns and dishwashers humming
with crickets and plush pillows
with beige carpets
beige table
beige couch

I wonder about learning a martial art
another language
(how would I choose which one?)
how to make croissants

how to learn to drive

Is that the only thing stopping me
from going to the woods for a few weeks
and howling the stains out
crying the confusion down to the
whittled tip?

Here I am
last night’s dreams on the coffee table
with the rattle and the book
the sun rising
towards all that is possible
etching light onto unknown

carving maybe on my toes

“You will find it” by Sasha on the couch on Oak Dr.

Tuesday September 17, 2019
6:01am
5 minutes
The Yak
Hilaire Belloc

You will find it somehow easier
than you imagined it would be
not that it’s easy but it’s easier

You don’t give advice in the offhand way
that you used to
You ask if it’s welcomed
You take off your shoes at the front door

You are tired of reading about
the end of the world
You are tired of questioning
your right to take up space

You walk by the water
with the sailboats skating across the horizon
You touch the fingertips of a tree
Make a joke with a hydrangea

You make dinner
make breakfast
make love
make amends

“Sorrows bring forth.” By Sasha on her couch

By: Sasha 09/14/201909/16/2019

5 minutes, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, writing, writing practise, writing project

Saturday September 14, 2019
11:53am
5 minutes
Proverbs of Hell
William Blake

I wish the sorrow would subside with the bluejays
and knowing when they call that they are asking
for what they need

I dream in visions like the oracles before me
like the vision of this person that I would bring forth
knocking on the door of my heart
with her signature sweetness and presence

The sound of the rain against the window
is different here than there
and there’s space in that that I need
that I’ve asked for

there’s truth in knowing what you need
admitting it to yourself
amidst all the other successes and failures
wins and losses
amidst all the grey

“He shone with Heavenly Courtesy” By Sasha at her kitchen table

Friday September 13, 2019
3:34pm
5 minutes
Courtesy
Hilaire Belloc

Courtesy doesn’t mean what she thinks it means
what she learns it means to be treated well
See she was raised to believe that love looked
cock-eyed and dimpled
that trust was something that could be given
and then snatched back for keepsies

She doesn’t know what it is to be treated well
until she’s forty three and hiking along the trails
of the Pacific Northwest and eating pecans and
protein bars
and she’s tired and she’s lonely and she’s one
with the arbutus and the pines

She realizes that blisters and bloody toenails
and coyote calls and listening to the sounds
of the night are all her
treating herself well
treating herself with courtesy

“If ignorance is bliss” By Sasha at her kitchen table

Thursday, September 12, 2019

5:07pm

5 minutes

The Benefits of Ignorance

Hal Sirowitz

If ignorance is bliss why then

I don’t want bliss

not in the form of head in the sand

fingers in the ears

not in the form of illusion dancing

in her opaque scarves

It’s been six weeks and all I crave

is protein and truth

seeing with the eyes of a woman

who has seen and been seen

as she knows is possible

as she knows is her birthright

Crunchy leaves underfoot

today on a walk in the neighbourhood

I found myself humming a song

that I taught myself in my dream last night

learned by heart on the strong back

of a premonition

that he only told me half the story

last night

Won’t admit fear where the spills are

where the stains are

won’t admit defeat

twirling his ring round and round

a quiet threat

I hum the song all the way back to the

garden and then I sit amongst the

butterflies and squirrels

the cone flowers and nasturtium

spicy open mouth

catching a taste

of what might be possible

I write him a letter in the major key

not to be predictable

not to be oppositional

but because the chord feels right

the timbre in my chest

my fingers playing imaginary keys

a new story

He loves me

that is why

don’t forget

It’s easier to know words

when they are put to music

“The courage that my mother had” by Sasha at the table upstairs

Tuesday September 10, 2019
12:25pm
5 minutes
The courage that my mother had
Edna St. Vincent Millay

My mother tells me that she
couldn’t have done what I’m doing

Not that anything is the same
Twenty-seven years between

what happened then
and what’s happening now

We speak of re-writing
of re-visioning

in a new tongue
built from rubble

and hope
I imagine a world in which

I do not need you
I do need you

Both are true
as this and that is

As faith and doubt are
love and rage

My mother’s courage
the bones that I build on

Flesh and sinew
teeth and tears

My mother’s courage
the rainbow prayer flags

strung up in the window
catching the wind

“I was so amazed” by Sasha in the garden

By: Sasha 09/07/201909/10/2019

creative writing, love poem, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, writing, writing practise, writing project

Saturday September 7, 2019
10:04am
5 minutes
Feasting
Elizabeth W. Garber

You give the credit away
clothes in the donation bin
shut it with a bang
and move on

Fill a closet up with new things
hope that the old things wear well
take good care of the old things
wonder when they’ll have holes

That credit is mine
thanks
I’ll know it as true
as the eyebrow scar
as true as the unknown

You’ll forget
that credit that’s mine
not owed but earned
I’ll try my best to remind you
Not overt
via a good song
via a deep breath
via letting go

I keep that credit in
a hidden breast pocket
ready to pull out when needed
ready to wait for the
right time

One day
maybe I’ll thank you

giving credit away
earned over months and minutes
marked with sweat
visions of Athena

birthing a baby girl
bringing life into being

Poems can hold this
nestled in next to
credit
love?
what is sacred

“So close to the end of my childbearing life” by Sasha on her couch

Tuesday September 3, 2019
7:32am
5 minutes
The Girl
Marie Howe

It was never a matter of if
it was only a matter of when
and the knock at the door started

months before we merged
magic and satisfaction
love and hope

the knock of your heart
on my heart

”let’s dance”
”it’s time”

Christmas time
three years ago
he told me he wanted
to have a baby together

He gave me a pacifier
and I behaved strangely

given that I’ve always known

It was the pacifier

Pacify
Placate
I don’t know
I was younger then
I didn’t know what I know now

I cried in the basement
of my parent’s house
the tree aglow two floors above

“and the words still ring true” by Sasha at her kitchen table

Sunday September 1, 2019
2:00pm
5 minutes
From Christy Webb’s Directors Notes (Lungs)

washer cycle turns and tosses
colours run and blue becomes grey
the soap suds make a song like
one you used to sing to the neighbour’s child

rocking her to sleep
oh oh oh the feelings yeah

maybe you’re singing to her
maybe you’re singing to yourself
or the her in you
the loss and the loving
the beauty of giving over to the
universal smackdown
that doesn’t kick her/your ass
in the way that they tell the stories
like these

like yours

someone hopes you don’t hate her
and you don’t
and you do

the words that rings truest
are the ones that don’t come out
in the wash
hanging the years on the line
all colours mixed together

birthday cards and photographs
train rides and waterfalls
beach fires and promises made

under the same sky
as this one

“Am I able to follow the spirit of love” by Sasha in her new home

By: Sasha 08/30/201909/08/2019

5 minutes, creative writing, love poem, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, writing, writing practise, writing projectheart, home, new home, unedied

Friday August 30, 2019

11:04pm

5 minutes

Quote by M.C. Richards

“Welcome home,” I whisper

to my heart

Split like a pea

pod askew

small green orbs

on the refinished floor

sweet and tender

”You’re here now,” I say

My mother just having left

to drive across town

back to where she lives

Good to be in the same city again

It’s been too long

It’s the first night my daughter will sleep

in this house

brick by brick maybe we will

maybe we won’t

but we’ll try

God knows

we’ll try

“We need to withdraw from impatience” by Sasha in her bathroom

By: Sasha 08/28/201909/08/2019

5 minutes, creative writing, love poem, ongoing writing practice, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, writing, writing practise, writing projectfive minutes, love, patience, unedited, weary

Wednesday August 28, 2019
12:35pm
5 minutes
Quote by Carol Antony

She asks him to be patient
new skin takes time to lose

the sheen of the burn
tender to the touch

He lunges towards distraction
tells himself it’s okay to want

what he wants
”Choice” is a marble

on both of their tongues
hidden in a cheek

a pocket
taken out when it’s just the two of them

Patience is a practise
that begs full surrender

maybe this is as far as they’ll go
She sits on the balcony

counts stars
Looks to the Pleiades for guidance

traces her way back
to him

When they find each other
they are weary

”I don’t need anything from you,” she says
He closes his eyes

“There must be something to worship.” By Sasha at her desk

Friday August 23, 2019

7:32am

5 minutes

Quote by Henry Miller

Deity on the corner holding herself accountable

chasing sunlight like a dog tail

braiding love with something red and soft

wrapping it around her shoulders

keeping herself warm

We hope for the best and when the worst comes

we let him in and have him at the table

He eats a big plate of pasta and meatballs

and forgets to put the toilet seat down

”It’s okay,” I say

and when he leaves I wipe the surfaces down

with vinegar and an old cut up T-shirt

Morning comes like a locomotive

Deity brushes her teeth and tells herself

that today will be a good day

”Today will be a very good day”

“Art making as a playful, life-supporting activity” by Sasha at her kitchen table

Tuesday August 20, 2019
7:31am
5 minutes
Quote by Joseph Zinker

I get in there and put the words on the page
At least I do that now
and then and tomorrow
I let it go and see where it takes me
I follow it
I listen
I catch the tail of inspiration
sometimes clumsy
sometimes sticky fingered
sometimes grasping
I throw it up to the Gods and see what rain comes down
see the colour of the water
see the flow of the rhythm

Fall fall fall free

These are noble things I think really
these are noble things

I count them on my fingers and toes
lying naked beside the truth
beside the moon

I count these noble things
noble truths
I hold them as I hold
you as I hold me as I
let go

“and eyesight a lying sense” by Sasha at her desk

Monday August 19, 2019
7:28pm
5 minutes
Lives Of The Eminent Philosophers
Diogenes Laertius

Slithering between the here and the then
the truth evades
shadow with no sun
I thought I knew you like
the freckles on my arm and that was
the lie that I told

Monday comes like a swan song
like a turning page and we are
re-writing what was written
re-imagining what was taken
kissing visions of how things
might’ve been goodbye

I hold tight to the belief
that the sky opens when she’s ready
that we don’t know what we don’t know
that we are doing our best
that love shatters

The morning the avalanche came
I said to you
“I trust you”
Your face eclipsed
I saw the crescent moon
illuminated
gaping

“But he was never seen practicing” by Sasha at her kitchen table

Sunday August 18, 2019
11:01pm
5 minutes
Cato The Younger
Plutarch

Julie says that you’re all about family
that it’s my job to make sure
you’re close to your people
feel the tether to the roots
to the blood to the source
“Don’t put her in daycare if you can help it
Have Grandma or Grandpa there”

Neptune transits coming around for all three of us
and I’m wondering about right now
What are the planets saying
What are the stars shouting to us
across shine and bright
A beauty has settled in the space
where the day broke

Down to the bone we go
Into the marrow we crawl

Julie says that your Sun needs to be present
needs to be physically close needs to touch you
We both do
Sun and Moon
Your arm touching my arm
Your toe touching his belly

Good grief
these things that we try to lean on
scaffolding
house of cards

“stop valuing receiving over giving” by Sasha on her couch

Saturday August 17, 2019
3:15pm
5 minutes
Lectures
Musonius Rufus

Hahaha that’s funny
I mean
It’s actually the opposite
giving and receiving
receiving and giving
Is it a gender thing
A learned thing
A patriarchy thing
breathing down the front
of my shirt towards my
wisdom towards my knowing

Give give give give give
we are taught before we can walk
apologize before we speak
mind the Q and the P
Oops
I mean
It’s actually the opposite

In the stick of the final
nights of summer
this person tells me that
I am not very good at receiving
or asking or getting
and I am suddenly faced with
myself from nine years ago

the one slipping into and out
of all the sheets that stack
to make the book that I’m
only now starting to write

“Slicing lake Ontario” by Julia at her desk

Sunday August 11, 2019
8:27pm
5 minutes
Catastrophe that Nearly Brought Down a Plane
Sabyasachi Nag

Darling tonight did you hear me ask you
a less than hypothetical question about
our children and about the future that
might show you just how much I’ve thought
about these things?

You didn’t seem to clock it and that
didn’t bother me then but it’s bothering
me now and I wished I had said, Excuse me
did you hear what I said about our kids
without you leading the charge?

These are moments for me to reflect on
by myself I suppose, because did I say
it out of truth gargling against my cheeks
or did I say it out of poetry and the
persistent chase of perfect phrases?

Are you changing your mind now that
I’ve got mine on straight? It would be so
sad after all this time if we had found
ourselves on different pages again. It
might break my heart into weapons.

I think about this future family of
ours and where the hell are they going
to live? In this one bedroom apartment?
In this city that you said yourself might be
too soft for them and for us and everything.

“Slicing lake Ontario” by Sasha at her desk

Sunday August 11, 2019
7:30pm
5 minutes
Catastrophe that Nearly Brought Down a Plane
Sabyasachi Nag

We’ll fly east in nineteen days
over the mountains that grew us
over the peaks that destroyed us
We’ll fly above the colours and
the clouds above the petty
grievances and the monumental hurts

We’re leaving a place we’ve known as home
five years of loving and living
of making art and granola and love
We’re leaving a place we’ve kissed
and bled and thanked and known
where our girl was born
the greatest feat of all

We’ll fly towards family
towards whatever roots are left
towards who knows really now that
everything is upside down
Secure the mask of the person next to you
I wish that was the case

All I know is I need the pressure of
my father’s hand
on my back
when he embraces me
My mother’s salad dressing
My sister’s eyes

We’ll slice over Lake Ontario
towards a speckled sky

“sucking everything in.” By Sasha at her desk

By: Sasha 08/06/201908/07/2019

5 minutes, five, five minute story, five minutes, poem, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, Uncategorizedbetrayal, burning, five minutes, flame, poem, poetry, these five minutes, unedited

Tuesday August 6, 2019
9:02pm
5 minutes
Across This Body
Jeni De La O

she sets herself on fire
it’s not the first time
but she burns differently

now that there’s the most to lose

ashes fly to the sky
flickering fantasy
floating towards the opposite
she explodes into all the

pieces of possible truths
colours like feelings
smoke of spirit
roar of the breaking

betrayal is a red
mixed into the blood

as she burns she paints
herself in the shades of
the now the ones
she predicted but always
wanted to escape

the true things
the small things
the things that are clever
and vicious

unknown

now that she’s nothing
she has everything
now that she’s here
she sees herself

whole
for the first time

“an overdose, the fire hall repainted red.” By Sasha at her desk

Monday August 5, 2019
10:42am
5 minutes
Orography
Alison Braid

I read you my writing
two poems
at the kitchen table
that’s grown seven feet
since this day last week

a kitchen table that sees
the pancakes and the salt
the chilli and the fights
the Scrabble and the worst

You meet me in the words
beyond the wrong and right
only by being present
but that’s enough for now

two poems
speaking the unspeakable
shrieking in their small stanzas
shaking ghosts from their pockets
sand from their ears

“retirement and investment savings” by Sasha at her desk

Saturday August 3, 2019
11:28am
5 minutes
From a piece of mail

I worried about money until other things came on deck
things that take more breath and bones than bills do

and that is privilege in action right

Fuck
I’m sorry

I used to think by thirty-three there’d be retirement
and investment savings but
well

that’s just not the case
like so many cases are not the case
and so many cases are
case closed
case re-opened
“In this case I…”

what is the case is broken hearts

and packing tape
and all our stuff piling up in a corner of a room
where I both do and don’t want to be
where I do and don’t need to be

healing hearts
hearts in throats
little kid hearts hurting so bad
wanting to heal
wanting release

wanting to teach our girl that
love looks like being true
and being true looks like vulnerability
and vulnerability is power

hearts in the hands of all the earthly angels that love us

I circle my mind
a low flying gull
ride her tail feathers towards destruction
ride her wings towards hope

“Redeemable exclusively at” by Sasha at her desk

Thursday August 1, 2019
6:47pm
5 minutes
From a Salvation Army flyer

These redeemable features
the striving for authenticity
the hope for freedom
What more do we want?

The crest of the lip
holds sweat and tears
The heart holds
more space
and then no space
and then more space

My smell has changed in these days
turned raunchy and rough
I can’t stop sniffing myself
smelling my fear
animal that I am
animals that we are
How we build from a series
of fumblings
stumbling towards
something true

“we always found a way” by Sasha on her couch

Wednesday July 31, 2019
11:10pm
5 minutes
From a thank you card

This is you, body coiled and then crumpled
naked in pillows, the baby thrashing
an arm’s length away

We have always found a way back to how we tether,
how we teethe the truth, a bone
like the dinosaurs on display

You want so much

This is the heart within the heart,
a love that I didn’t know was possible,
the ache that grabs my throat

licks my cheek,
tells me to grovel and snarl,
thumbs protected by fingers,

protected by the willingness to pretend.
I stick sorry across your torso,
your back, your jaw

I want so much

I see myself through your eyes
and she’s a famished feral one,
governed by hunger

frozen by fear.
I stick sorry on the tip of my tongue,
lick my arms, legs, belly

Hold up one finger to you
A white flag.

“no one would know me.” By Sasha at her desk

Monday July 29, 2019
10:42pm
5 minutes
The Landing
Marie Howe

I build a home for you
and you live in it
day after night after afternoon
adding your skin to the dust bunnies
adding your hair to the nests under the sink
adding your voice to the whispers
stored in the paint of the walls

I build a good home for you
for us
for two and then three
for the three of us
I keep the pantry stocked
and the floors swept
I keep the truth on the table
until we snuff out the candle
and say goodnight
I dream of a time before this
a time after this
I dream of a great undoing

A lighthouse fills my heart
dim tonight than ever before
I leave the light on
for you though
for myself
for the three of us
even in the crest of the tsunami

“your ability to project charismatic body language” by Sasha at her desk

Saturday July 27, 2019
5:38pm
5 minutes
The Charisma Myth
Olivia Fox Cabane

You do not know self consciousness
Your face the pure expression of feeling
You see the floral blanket and the joy
ripples from top to bottom explodes
out your tiny fingertips

It was hot last night and our naked bodies
touched through each dream and breath
Crescent moon eyelashes the very thing
I didn’t know I’d always dreamed of
Sweetness here now curled against my belly
the same one I felt a year ago in those
first appleseed days

Three months of knowing you
separate from my body
although that’s hardly true
Three months of you being here with us
giving back so much more than I thought possible
Why did I think it was going to be so hard?

Walking home from tying up frayed loose ends
it was easier than I thought
barely an effort really
effortless in it’s grace
I said to myself
“Why was I so afraid?”
and the sun on the sweetgrass growing
flooded me with the truth of
letting go

“I can’t handle this” by Sasha at her kitchen table

Thursday July 25, 2019
10:10am
What Every Body Is Saying
Joe Navarro

Sometimes
when the sweat is trickling down
the nape of the neck
the back is tight from slouching
the heart is weary from all the love
all the stretching

These times
one might think
“I can’t handle this”
Too full
Too sticky
Too messy
Too unknown
Too much

This, too
I say in a moment of
surrender
in a light prism of
yes
This, too

“Bishop Family Bees” by Sasha at her desk

Saturday July 20, 2019
12:02pm
5 minutes
Honey Child Apothecary

You and me
we raise bees in our backyard
only have a bit of space
a few concrete slabs
a tiny patch of grass
but it’s something I’ve always
wanted to do
and always feels closer
since we met grief at the dump

You build the hive out
of old shipping crates
scored on Craigslist
for free
I find second hand bee suits
for us
turns out more people
want to raise bees
than you think
but a lot of things can go wrong
and it’s hard work

I dream about being
covered in honey
arms-length of sticky gold
breaking into the comb
a bear in summer

“She heard a deeper vibration” by Sasha at her desk

Thursday July 18, 2019
10:50am
5 minutes
From a quote by Willa Cather

She sits on the edge of my bed
her body different than ever
but this isn’t about her body
for once
this is about her transformation
not that body and transformation are mutually exclusive
just that too much attention has been paid to form
and now it’s about something formless
more important

She’s wearing a burnt caramel
three quarter sleeved shirt
it’s her colour
when I see this colour in the wild it reminds me of her
She’s talking about gratitude
like it’s her new guru
like it’s saving her life
and it is

Shrouded in white
glowing aura of wisdom and wreckage
gratitude leads her back
to the place that broke her
heart
the first time round

“shoved me into the bathroom” by Sasha in her bed

Tuesday July 16, 2019
7:52pm
5 minutes
A Head Full OF Ghosts
Paul Tremblay

Hands around my hips
pushing me towards the open door
Is this the life
I always dreamed of?
Molson on my breath
and All Dressed chips
I wish I’d eaten something
better

We’re up against the sink
graffiti on the walls
Is this all there is?

“Why aren’t you into this?”
Who are you?
“Shit, I’m sorry…”
Down on my knees but he
pulls me up and back
and mouths and breath
and eyes and my mother
used to say that I had
a strange nose it didn’t
come from either lineage
it is all my own

Someone flushes in the
other bathroom
We laugh

“What’s your name?”

“your teeth glint” by Sasha at her desk

Saturday, July 13, 2019
10:51am
5 minutes
Next Time
Lucy Yang

Your teeth glint
refraction of streetlamp
and truth
Your mouth is bigger than ever
fizzing future
foaming present
shhhhh past

It’s July and it’s not as warm
as we’re used to this time of year
The only smoke is coming from
the change
the fizzing foaming shhhh-ing
At least for now
We’re lucky
I suppose

Keep reminding myself of that

I wake sweaty from a dream
baby wiggling for my breast
sighing in her sleep

Someone left their kid
in the hot car and they died

Water is the only thing
that brings me comfort in this
strange and stinking desert

Tears
Showers
Room temperature from the jug
on the counter

“contact the storage directly” by Julia at her desk

Thursday, July 11, 2019
4:32pm
5 minutes
From the Secure Storage website

In my dream you were there as if
it hadn’t been 4 years of silence
When our other friends left the room
I looked at you, still there, shrugging
Was this night more awkward because you
and I haven’t talked anything out yet?
You wait to answer because the answer
is yes but you are there waiting for me
I didn’t know if you wanted to talk…
And now it is my turn to wait, to ask
myself, floating above my body if, maybe,
I do

Things are said but mostly not and
by the end of the scene we are hugging
deeply and I have said I love you again
and you have cried and said I love you back

You didn’t look the same and your calm
was foreign to me from what I remember and
yet I knew it was you there, wondering if
anything is possible the way they say it is

I gave you my answer and then I woke up,
glad that in the dream, after drawing the
card of Mercy, I could see what that might
look like even if no real action
had yet been taken

“contact the storage directly” by Sasha at her desk

Thursday, July 11, 2019
10:14am
5 minutes
From the Secure Storage website

I wonder if a time will come when
we do away with all the past hurt
stored in boxes in the closet
stacked one on top of the other
amidst the cleaning stuff and the
cans of black beans and chickpeas
paprika from Hungary
oats in a paper bag

I wonder when you will not be tight
and I will not be sorry

what will be between us then
the lightness and dust of these corners
a decade of daisy chain evolution
some flowers losing their bright
some gaining new growth
measured in commas and almost finished
stories measured in scratches
measured in letting go

I wonder what will come of this
and where you’ll put your righteousness down
what will be born of the true new

who will you allow me to be
in your paper doll cut out clothes
of not quite enough
torn at the places where you
stick them to my body
pin the tail on the woman
doing her best

“Taking a trip?” By Sasha at her desk

By: Sasha 07/09/201907/11/2019

5 minutes, creative writing, ongoing writing practice, poem, short poem, tiny poem, Uncategorized, writing, writing practise, writing projectbirds, five minutes, new languages, poem, poetry, unedited

Tuesday July 9, 2019
12:02pm
5 minutes
From a TD Bank envelope

We talk three years in the future
a new language buried in our cheeks of
grandparents and long-haul flight snacks

We make promises that we know we can’t keep
but that’s what we all do right
that’s how we fool ourselves into the future
tumbling over and under
singing James Brown
singing lullabies

I’m always singing this song to you
especially on rainy days when the trying
gets tried and there’s nothing but
the birds on the balcony
trying to rustle up a seed
from the empty feeder

“because they don’t realize” by Sasha on her balcony

By: Sasha 04/20/201904/21/2019

5 minutes, creative writing, five, five minute story, five minutes, ongoing writing practice, poem, poetry, short poem, these five minutes, tiny poem, Uncategorized, writing, writing practise, writing projectbody,

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