Black cowboys (Minimoog, Pt 3)

Eastwick and Milne
kept me safe
for a while
until the next
stage rehearsal

this time
in Calgary
at a school
where we were
temporarily housed

Nellie McClung
wasn't yet ready
but it held
great promise
being purpose built
so we were told
with a central library
ringed
by open concept
classrooms

Image result for nellie mcclung school calgary

the fact
that Ms. McClung
had been a suffragette
and an MLA

was lost on use
7 and 8
as we were
wanting only
a playground
or a hopscotch grid
painted on the compound
so we could
trace our steps
chasing after
house keys
because
in those days
we were all latchkeys
or wanted to be
if we weren't
there was something
about the charm
of a fridge
that dispensed ice

Image result for ice dispensing fridge 1970s

and the possibility
of snacks
to be had
dreamed of
all afternoon
and if you got there first
snacks
to be snatched
before brothers could
take them

with construction
on Nellie McClung
behind schedule
and school opening delayed
we sheltered
at John Ware

a place that had
a different story
this time
of a black cowboy
on the prairies
a sight none
of us had seen
but was apparently
a reality
in Amber Valley

but that was worlds away

and all we knew
of blacks
was Mohammed Ali
and Joe Frasier
who was so ugly
Ali said
even his mother said
when he cried
the tears rand down
the back of his face

but like so much else
we heard
on the radio
or the supper table
it wasn't something
you could repeat
so the portrait
of Ware
in the lobby
of the school
of him
in chaps
with a horse

or a hound

or wresting a steer
at the Bar U ranch

was not something
we had seen
or knew how to address
as we filed
through
to the stage
where
curtained
off from gym class
we sat
around a piano
and prepared to learn
with the lethargy
of Summer
still addling
our brains

it was months
before Nellie McClung
was ready
but there was time enough
to get settled
into Grade 3

Mrs. Dunsmore
and Miss Taylor
who
replaced the former
for a time
while she
had surgery
or took time off
for reasons
never talked of
these teachers
Scottish marms
trained in Saskatchewan
as was proper
or maybe mandatory
we had
in our windowless room
on the stage
asked us not to play
with the curtains
or tousle little girls' hair
but instead
learn
to greet the morning
after God Save the Queen
and I Salute the Flag
with words
that promised meaning
if only we could remember them
when it was useful
to us
sun rise
face east
hands by side
now stand steady
stretch arms wide
north to the left
and south to the right
west behind you
out of sight.

Animals and aliens

When you think of Orwell's Animal Farm , you get stuck on the idea of some being more equal than others. But world peace, galactic harmony, the celebration of diversity and the active practice of inclusion are all achieved in science fiction by casting minorities in the role of animals and aliens. Star Trek comes to mind in this regard, where even hippies were disposed of, Federation style, as sensitive dissenting aliens, not forgetting Spock with his pointy ears! And then there were Wookiees, still man's best friend. Viewing animals as humans--anthropomorphizing--or treating different races as aliens, all of this is shape shifting. This shape is my shade, there where I used to stand--that's Steely Dan.

Of course she's not a true red

As the parent of a "ginger", and having red heads on both sides of the family, and having married into two Irish families, I know first hand that ginger covers the whole spectrum from strawberry blonde (to my way of thinking a classic ginger!), to orange (carrot tops), to a real rust red (what my father in law would call a true red). When Pat Todkill first set eyes on his granddaughter, he remarked, "Of course, she's not a true red". For one thing, Emily the Elder lacked freckles on her face and upper body. For another, she really was and is a strawberry blonde. A further observation. Even people with the raven blackest hair have rust red lights--caveman red, soot covered ochre if you like. Woolly mammoth red. Sometimes it takes just the right light to pick out the smoldering ember, but beard and eyebrows tend to incorporate the tell tale ginger strain, like chili pepper in a spice jar of mixed pepper corns. And, of course, brunette...

The city mover beat me to the chicory this evening maybe if I had passed by earlier I could have caught a glimpse of them but they will rise Phoenix like from the close cropped pile of grass and weed and present their brash and uneven beauty once again before the need for carpet and trimming loops of magic made by subterranean rug weavers is once again mandated and duly executed by the city crew in the burnt orange cabs of their ride along mowers browning the backs of their hands and letting the heat weather beat their faces to match the cabs and fulfill some unspoken contract between landscaping and maintenance and the gods of Chance Fortune as ever favouring the bold there will be other routs of the mover before the Summer is done and more rain hopefully if I can contain the fear of thunderheads building and more returns of visible biodiversity Nature never surrenders unconditionally but like a lover choosing her battl...

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