LONG LISTED FOR THE 2023 GRIFFIN POETRY AWARDS
Furniture
When, finally, my discomfort intensified I shifted
to my other foot
on Such Street, yet my feet have ruined me for years;
so I stand at the street light that they won’t have any
way out anymore;
then, because of the crisis due to my sickness, I had
to pay attention to common things, but, in God’s
name, get rid of all these pins;
yet the worst of all was the waiting room where
I, the traveller, often lost myself and as I made
beautiful plans in darkness I felt totally useless
in the light, like the coffin maker who looks around
with worrying eyes
since each person dies at a different hour and Philip,
when he returned from Doomsday (it was perhaps true)
he brought back just a spittoon; I helped him with
my savings and
the good news starts when you accept, from early
in the morning, the upcoming night
until, quietly and methodically, using the craftiness
of many eons,
I kneeled. And let the others stumble on the furniture.
Hellenic Canadian Literature 