Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Deserve

The term "drunk male-prostitute"
Gets thrown around a lot these days...
But I'm here to tell you that hash anthems,
And waking up to Rush, particularly "Closer to the Heart"
BLARING on the CBC, at, I shit you not,
Seven in the A.M.
Makes me feel proud to be a Canadian.

It's easy love
Like the office copy-girl.

Nationalism always blooms late,
Like the Yard's apple trees, this spring.
I hope that when I move to America,
There is flora all around,
And I can forget my nervous heart.
Know that I can lose the dividends
In a stylish car-chase scene.
I want to fit your family like moccasins made during dreamtime.
If we fight, we can sweat it out, I swear.

Roll me in pancakes,
Let me tend to the flocks.
And if the opportunity presents itself,
An exquisite murderama?
All night sleeping bag hide-outs,
Blink at me animal child.
Sweet as a mass grave for diabetics,
And figs in my eyes, and jingle bells stuck in my throat,
Stop. Look.
And Listen.

4 comments:

Andrew said...

I think you should take the word "dead" out of the line "Sweet as a mass grave of dead diabetics." Its redundant. I also don't know how I feel about the first two lines. I feel like I may be missing something about the drunk-male prostitutes phrase itself, but I guess in spite of the tone I kind of think its too much too soon, too obviously in there for the sake of grabbing attention. I also don't know if I like the last two lines, but the stanza immediately preceding it is really good. I especially like "jingle bells stuck in my throat." Its a solid piece and I think it pulls off its sense of humor well, but I think the very beginning and very end could be better.

Panda said...

You're totally right about the redundancy, I was just thinking about it, and came to change it and you had already beat me to the punch.

As for the "drunk male-prostitutes" reference, as well as the whole, Rush, theme - come from one specific episode of The Trailor Park Boys, where the main characters break in through an underground tunnel to a stadium to see the band, and calling this, that, and the other person a "drunk male-prostitute" is a diversion that is classically implemented throughout the series by Ricky.

The whole thing is kind of supposed to be a bunch of Canadiana jive-talk... with no real clear attribution to sources, it's kinda self indulgent. (Just like me.)

Keith said...

2112

Andrew said...

Clear attribution to sources is majorly lame. I'll consider it my fault not knowing what you were talking about, but now that I understand the backstory of that part of the poem I revoke my criticism of it.