when in montreal

written on a cell phone notes app on august 8, 2017. poem.

another installment of the “Cell Phone Notes” series. if you think these are A Lot, you should see the ones i tapped out on my iPhone SE in 2015.

features: imagery involving a trip to a Canadian lakehouse that you have never been to. but the imagery includes dogs and turtles so, really, how can you refuse? to be honest the whole poem is a bit stale, and i would have struck it from the website, except the last part about bees is quite nice. manages to get me every time.


the church is beautiful as all churches are

beautiful. a woman walks in with her

family and her jaw gapes. i think she is

crying. the church is beautiful and i think

of the church we saw in Budapest. St.

Stephen’s Basilica. no picture i took came

close to doing it justice. i think of the cabin

we stayed in in Kingston. i wonder if the

water is a bit more placid today. when we

went it was rough and angry, smashing up

against the shore. the dogs jumped in

anyways, gleeful and struck with

madness. i think of my brother and his

shovel and the small pile of turtle eggs. i

didn’t think eggs could bleed, but i saw the

red streaks smeared on the shell as a

sludge of yolk slipped out. all noise in the

church is reduced to a quiet hum, and i

wonder how that is possible. the green of

the church arches is so dull that it seems

flat somehow, like a painting. i really do

love stained glass windows. i do not know

how they are made, but i always imagined

workers lovingly dipping shards of glass

into honey. but then, i guess all the bees

would come. it might be nice, a church full

of bees. the dull buzz probably sounds like

a prayer.