They want us to be real, clumsy maybe

Capturing video over the years on a Super 8

Crackling like cold butter on toast.

Funny, the short reel of film

Captures all the best moments. All that money.

You know, every one goes to Florida,

Goes to prom, in a dress

And we forget that it wasn’t a factor of ability.

And we continue to tell the girl that she’s beautiful

Because that’s what you do.

They want us to be wild, frenzied even

Rollerblading through our twenties

And explaining to our children that it was the times,

The years. You go looking through dusty hatboxes

To find a picture of your grandmother

And you say that she was a beautiful woman.

She is standing by the Christmas tree,

The first car, the threshold, in grandpa’s arms

With a grade-11-diploma smile on her face.

She called herself a bohemian in those days,

Those years, with her hair like curling ribbon

When you drag scissors through it, and her tawny barrette

As good as her own housekeeping.

They want to invade our admirations, clean them up

I always liked the way you said “forget”

And the way your ears poked through your hair

And the way your knees looked in a pair of

Blue jeans, starchy, not like you.

I try to decide based on that re-incarnation bull*&#^

If you’re an old soul or a new soul, and I give up.

And so I curl my R’s the way you do

And brush my hair to the front

And pull my bell bottoms so they rest around my hips,

And I figure you’re both. An old and a new soul.

I go canvassing in my neighbourhood to find out

What’s pretty. I compile their preferences,

Murdering local affections,

And whatever runs past these residential houses

Like city transit is what sells a bottle of whiskey.

With that attitude, I might as well buy myself

A plane ticket to Florida.

RATE THIS CHAPTER!