Dream Poem
The label on my can of whoop-ass
Says it’s past its “Best By” date.
I crack it open anyway, pleased
It still hisses. The ingredients list
Is so sciencey, I can’t imagine
What it tastes like. Mumbonium
Jumbonite. I long for someone
To walk through that door in the ceiling
And just breathe. Just be floored
At the flavour of the air in here.
O for my empty can to show itself
A flower, a late spring peony
Or October rose. Almost scentless,
Having bled its weeks-long donation
Into the perfumery we call nature.
Do you smell that? Me neither.
That’s how we know it’s there.
Stewart Cole is a Canadian expatriate living in the Upper Midwest. He is the author of two full length poetry collections, Questions in Bed and Soft Power (both with Goose Lane Editions) and two chapbooks, Sirens (Cactus Press) and Alien Freight (Anstruther Press).