God is Good at Dying

young, I learned the faith of cycles, how
hop-scotch adhered to rules and a toe
falling onto the sidewalk meant the end
of my turn,

or an unanswered question
in geography class confirmed that I knew
nothing beyond the neighbourhood of
my house, my blanket, my bed

positioned to a rising moon, the tug
of gravity, the riddle of a dark
through which street cleaning machines
wandered on summer nights

evaporated by morning dew and games
in the schoolyard, trips to the corner store,
conversations with ants and squirrels
scaling the corporate jungle trees,

societies withing spiralling aspects
of Kitchener, from Farmer’s Market
to the library, city hall and King Street,
snake eating its commercial self


and I watched it all die to be born again

stock market, house prices, the cost
of almonds compared to dates from
foreign countries, softener salt, razor blades,
retirement or continue working

faith in the market, throwing out floppy disks
of arcane programs, a wealth of
useless Windows © manuals, ten
years of National Geographic, vinyl music

the perfect karmic way to wealth,
good sex, good skin, low blood pressure,
a diet of pornography, ten children,
servant’s quarters about the credit card,

greed on demand and bodies igniting
in twenty thousand renditions of Jonestown,
the unimportance of a mere child, the way
the animal lurks behind a man’s eyes,

fear, fear, fear, greed, greed, greed,
twenty bottles of Bordeaux, one Burgundy,
a yacht, brushed brass appliances,
calamari on a salad bed drizzled with olive oil
to feed the void of bones where god continues to die