E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG - FREEDOM MEANS BEING UNAFRAID TO WRITE WHAT YOU THINK

The Fourth King I could have done more, following that star; pausing, let my eyes wander, at the oasis, though, to other, closer flashings.  Light on the gold around a girl’s throat.  The pomegranate’s myriad redness, interior stars clotted into fruit; the way that water when it rises from a well weighs nothing in its sweet necessity.  The swell of her breast as she breathes.  Night cold as a blade, and all the other stars, though never as bright, strangely alluring in their alternative light. So, I stayed days and nights among the travellers: some with tangled slaves; others rich in stories alone; our opulence was limited by our place in the desert; we would fast again before winter had brightened off, as each chose when to leave this slivered ideal of a paradise, no larger than a small market in a dusty town; but flourishing this time in green and...

A Christmas Story They couldn’t get through Because of the snow So all that icicle day He stuck to the window Too shy to pray Too small to say Why have you abandoned me? Then, at the final hour, As eve lifted to morning Hooves clattered like squirrels In the eaves, soot rained And ho ho hos and bells Made truth beautiful As any white lie; a clot of coal Single and uneven on the mantel; Who had told on him? Had his sins been so thorough? Now, gifted judiciously By his untrim hero, A hirsute saint in a fat suit, He came to learn his worth Set about rubbing palms black Wherein the spark of a diamond (Hope) cut against skin’s frail grain. Better to believe, be damned Than rise to empty promise A chalky kiss in the garden; Heart pain unwraps as balm. poem by Todd Swift

Reflections on the Confession of Tiger Woods Slowed by what slows the mood I locate by moving slowly the good Which is simply the bad passed Without, in the process, becoming toast. Sex addicts and poets are lost In the flood of power that most becomes Those who reside in interior luxury; The sea overrides the beach, desires To reach the inland empires, may breech The green controlled lawns of golf; There is a gulf between swing and speech, But tongue and arm both touch The rough yawn that lies between fire And rain, beauty and being plain; No god or man or woman resists a lyre If plucked by a finger that has tension And release at its recall; longer fingers Better caress the strings. Redder lips best Sing of wine and grape-sweet nights; Light demolishes the injurious sheets, Renders them just fabric, not gold thread, Pulls back the lids to let us see That the lover we sought to overcome In our riding passion is a tomb, And all the soldiery are not drunk but dead. Skin is what we touch...

I would like to offer a very special Christmas poem to all my readers this year. It was written Christmas, 2005, which was the last I would spend with my father. We spent Christmas in Richmond, Quebec, at my grandparents' home, across the river from Melbourne. An Eastern Townships Christmas is about as idyllic as one can get. Snow is half-a-man deep, and the fir tree boughs are laden with it. Days we'd ski or walk in the woods, nights sit by a roaring fire, and read Robert Frost . This poem is set in this territory, which is where my mother grew up. I've found a most appropriate image, a painting set within a mile or less of where it was written (though a hundred years before) by Frederick Simpson Coburn , the painter and illustrator who was born in Melbourne, Quebec, before moving to study in Berlin and Paris. Curiously enough, he became an illustrator for some of the stories of Edgar Poe , in New York in the early 1900s, which perhaps also ties in with the slightly macabr...