1.
fold the table
put it away
the books
must go
on the floor
sand generously
2.
nibbled cladding
a lost grammar
3.
whiffed
thyme
4.
all roads
lead to
one place
avoid roads
5.
only one thing
for so long
so, so long
6.
04:10, let the wind do
its work
heal this wound
7.
my great aunt
on the lawn
with the Bren gun
taking a bead
on deadheads
in Cow Bay
8.
i’m making a list
of all the hands
i’ve held in mine
what is my name?
phantom-chaser
9.
it’s only the new
sewer pipe
going in
but now we’ll know
the sound of tanks
in the streets
at night
10.
the brother on the
grass
behind the pink
Safeway
legs tucked up into
his coat
four hundred days
into the pandemic
11.
great aunt at the
woodstove
plunging a stick
in and out
of an open kettle
churning smalls
in Kelowna
12.
lockets on strings
around their necks
who is that?
this i’m told is my
mother
and that is my father
13.
fellings?
who’s asking?
14.
a lark ascending
without a lark
Marx, mute, in the
park
spring peepers
tonight, i hear you
loud and Clare
15.
perhaps the lost one
saw clearly
16.
the stars on my shirt
tonight
albaplena in the upper field
17.
David McFadden, in the
bookstore
recommending The
Confessions
of Saint Augustine*
18.
farewell old guys in
regimental ties
my savings are more lethal
19.
i’d like to step out
of history
20.
if a word becomes a
flag
burn it
28 July 2025
* Nelson, B.C. September 1982.
Two recent collaborations between Colin Browne and composer Alfredo Santa Ana were premiered in early April at the Fox Cabaret in Vancouver. A collection of Colin’s texts for music, entitled Into the Air, is in the works. His new book, The Possible, is an account of the visits by Surrealist artists to the Northwest Coast in the early 20th century. The book details the experiences of Kurt Seligmann and his wife Arlette in Hazelton, B.C., during the summer of 1938, and the journeys of Wolfgang Paalen, Alice Rahon, and Eva Sulzer from Alaska to Vancouver Island from June-August 1939.
the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan
