i am in winnipeg
so i don't have to decide
if i should buy a pc membership
to vote for jim dinning

doubling the afa budget
within two years
that sure sounds sweet

ted morton is a fag hating fuckstick

so i am not rooting for him

but since i am in winnipeg
i'll just watch
i have a lot of clothes here
so if it doesn't go my way
maybe i'll just stay here
they are NDP in manitoba
they have elections
where different people get elected
what is that called?

democracy

this right now is the closest
alberta has come to an election
in a long while

i am hoping for dinning
i am hoping for a laugheed style
i am hoping to apply for more than one grant
per fiscal annum

ted morton might help
get the liberals elected sooner
but he won't help anything else

and did i mention the fag hating?

dinning is winning
but not by much

if you are not in winnipeg
maybe get a pc card
after the election
we can burn them ceremoniously
the smoke will get ted morton high
and he will have his first gay experience
touching and sad
and sexually intense
he will come out to his congregation
come on to his organist

and the world will be a better place

a little

today was a day to get things done
to answer emails
and talk alot on the phone
about different projects
i won't list them
in case i get accused of bragging
or something

maybe some ex sort of almost
never really was
girlfriend of mine
will write a mean letter
and it will take me a week
to figure out who it was

but things need tending
the garden has to grow
well it doesn't have to
in fact
the odds are against it
that's why i need
so much fertilizer

but i have never claimed
that my fertilizer doesn't stink

does yours?

sometimes they want to publish a play based on a book published by a company that sold the rights to a larger company and you have to ask them

things can get complicated
did that sound like bragging
i didn't mean to
now i feel a bit anxious

maybe i should counterpoint
by talking about the chunky soup
i just ate
chicken ala king
with rivita crackers
delicious!
all in my apartment bed
where i spend most days
typing
and phone calling
and waiting
for the show at night
the drinks after
for the snow to stop falling
for my girl to get her flowers

oh she just did!
she texted me happy
now i am happy too
that's how it works

when you party a lot
you start to get used to it
do the hangovers lessen
or just become familiar?

early in the morning
but not that early
early for me is still early
for me

laptop warming my thighs
the office season three
american version
i like that show
it's really funny
even though its the american version
which is supposed to be worse
there are examples

my day off yesterday
i saw two movies
they were okay
it is easy to run out of decent movies
at my rate of consumption
which is high
but leaves little waste
except diet coke burps
and popcorn poo

cab and beth read me some
of my new play
it's coming along
it takes so many ideas
to write a decent thing
luckily they beget each other
like bible characters

one more week in winnipeg
then it's home
for christmas

phonecall

my girlfriend has a crush on me
because I am not there
(that's not why)
my plants are dying
but it is not her fault
she is trying
they just miss me
she does too

it's lovely to be around babies
she says
she see her friends with their children
they are so happy, amazing, spiritual
to share that

but the stronger feelings are
holy fuck
they are so loud
they move so much
and they want so much
and they need so much
a mixture of strong attraction
and strong repulsion
she says

are you laughing at me
she says
because i was
i hear you typing
should i let you go?

i am typing what you're saying
i say
and then
she says
then i won't say anything at all

someone practises trumpet
above me
i hear voice exercises
in the morning
this is an artsy little hotel

by the mall
near the best buy

today i don't know what to do
about
anything

my teeth are larger than my mouth
so i am always biting off
more
than
i
can
choose

between

be brave
make choices
what is better than nothing?
anything.
sometimes

there are things
that are hard and fast
rules
are not one of them
in this case
in which case
who's case
is this?

it's full of papers
i don't recognize
a swath of math
a hood of blood

somethings don't rhyme
even if they look like they should

split level pads
with so many roomates
that we're always out of milk
i ask questions
i seek input
i get lots
but from the outside

I'm working blind

and

the people who will complain
will not lend me two cents

from each according to their ability
to each according to their needs
sometimes need outstrips ability
and i am not a communist
or am i?

i still don't speak spanish
our subject matter grew
i am not smart enough
for my life

are you?

jump in swim
jump in drown
in the end
no
one
cares
which
i
do
but
me
you can drown in a bathtub
but you never do

that's true of everybody
think about it

a penny saved
is a penny earned
if you get that kind of interest
i am switching to your bank

my interest is waning
my wayne is interesting
no is called wayne anymore
or glenn
or morley

or edith

we're all achingly unique snowflakes
so we use more beautiful words

someday my son
Venison
and my daughter
Suduko
will tell me to
fuck off
and take the car
without permission

and then i'll know
that i should have just had
dogs
or a career
or a drinking problem
maybe
if i try hard
i could have all three

all i really need
is the dog

the day after
the party the night before
one might feel fatigued
during their two show day
one might lack patience
for the teenagers
who snigger and text

but me
i'm not even hung over

today i miss my girlfriend
so much
it is like a pain in my torso
in between the lungs
below my heart

Robert Altman

Hail to Robert Altman
He made good movies
He made bad movies
He made his movies
His way

He made Short Cuts
He made Popeye
He made the Player
He made Pret a Porter
He made good and bad movies
But they were all his

Be like Robert Altman
Make good things
Make bad things
Make your things

Live like you
until you're very old
And then die

trying to get on the internet can take hours
if there are issues
and there are

i am on the cable kind
but not the wireless now
my dragon is leashed
and now i am not absorbing media
at the rate to which i have become accustomed

so many reboots
so many trials
and errors

why don't i just call the shaw people
in the first place?
huh? why?

opening night

Mistakes were made
By me mostly
And others
It was not the best show ever
But god bless them
They bought it

Fictional characters drank with
Their actual progenitors
Lish by Lish
She even wore the hat

Steve and Lee showed up
With Marcie and um, Steve’s girlfriend
Very nice people
Herbie was there
I met lesli and james
He does great impressions of people we know
Authentic David Craig
Uncanny Ron Jenkins

We stayed up late at the basement party
Why not?

iPod versus iPod
So many halleluhjahs
That song
Gives me memories of the pain I used to feel
When I heard
That song

They left us there
I guess they trust us
I wouldn’t leave a visiting company
To end a party at my theatre
We were good citizens
We cleaned up after ourselves
Clean dishes
Piled up

The cab driver
Got lost
It made him angry
Brad reasoned with him
It was awkward
To take
The long way home

No one knows where queen street is
Not even me

Enter, smoke, turn on tv
Colbert is on again at four
Just in time to watch it
Before sleep kicks in my door

So I rhyme sometimes
So what

the long distance is free
the wireless internet password
still a mystery to us
and gloria
who runs the hotel

but i set up a computer to computer network
with somebody called airnet
sorry airnet
i am stealing from you
this bandwith was yours
but now it's mine

tonight we open the play
excitement is something i will have soon
i just had a little
just then

i will see my friends
steve and lee and miriam
maybe herbie
we will hug each other

the fake party is a cover
the real party is downstairs
you can come
if we like you

there is a giant moose head
and couches in a square
places to sit and stand
big enough to fit
small enough to make us cozy

we ate at perkins
gossiped about theatre
we always do
it's where we work

shopped at safeway
bought enough food to make
a poor immigrant cry
such plenty
and me without a horn

if i had one of my own
i wouldn't blow it myself
it's rude

maybe tonight i will poet again
but drunkenly
and shrunkenly
with all i have spent of myself
you'll get the last dribble
maybe

whoever said getting there was half the fun
was not on my flights
he did not take my cabs through rush hour post blizzard roads
he did not repack the prop box on the scale
is it light enough now?
how about now?

being here is most of the fun

because the hotel is wicked
a little farther
but fuck it
i can call cabs
with the best of them

the apartment is well appointed
the tv big screen
a dishwasher
the mall is close
big box stores everywhere
chain restaurants
but lots of them

we ate at joey's
i had the ahi tuna club
the only club to have someone like me as a member
it was delicious

tommorrow we tech
we preview after that
we line ran tonight
i am not out of breath

the opening, the theatre is not throwing us a party
they have the money
but it no one's job
miriam is a governor general's award winning novelist
this is the first play made from one of her books
set here, in her hometown
is that not worth 20 beers and a mixtape?

this is why no one in canada is a star
because we don't know one when we see one

miriam is a star and we know it
so we will throw the party ourselves
the techs whisper of a secret room
in the basement
where we can drink and talk and be
together
I have only been here for the fringe
they don't tell the fringe about the room
new countries
in a world i thought i knew

I am home
for 36 hours
wearing my own robe
kissing my own girlfriend
we watched our own tv last night
and had our own sexual experience
you can't have it
it's ours

i had dinner with my own family last night
almost all of the western leg
which is, let's face it
the main family
these days

dad made one of his speeches
about how proud he is of us
i like his speeches a lot
he always tells us how he feels now
now that we know about dying
nothing goes unsaid now
we're that kind of family

we ate ham
and a fruity dessert pizza
it was awesome
and relatively low fat
for my relatives
who are relatively high fat
it runs in our family

someday i will quit the gym and my diets
go somewhere really high
and
let
myself
go

it's tradition

today i am home
for 36 hours
me and jania will have a nice day
you can't have it
it's ours

if i wrote a poem in code
it might look like this:

then again it might not


it would be an easy code
because i have nothing to hide

the wizard of oz was on
it was a flop when it came out
and was only appreciated after it's death
like me

google is reading my poems
trying to decide what to sell you
based on my blank verse

it's funny

there is a strange isolated happiness
when you are wearing headphones
and everyone else is sleeping
they think it's quiet
but i know the truth
is much louder

there is a strange weary grasping
when you are checking your email this much
is writing so bad
that you bore yourself silly avoiding it?

procrastination is not a pro but a con
of oneself out of time
which i am not, not yet
but will be eventually, and time
is money, which i was paid to write
as a writer, a professional writer
partially

the money is gone, or this the same money
i can't remember which dollars i saved
and which i spent
on the things i spend on

generous, rich feeling phases
followed by miserly fear
expanding and contracting
like the universe

poor vernon little
books where everything goes so wrong for the innocent hero
make me anxious
poor ficticious character
poor everyone

i wish i could write novels
but i don't even want to write a play
i just want it written
and in rehearsals
and very good

yet somehow
i find the time for these poems
maybe because the internet is involved
it seems like play
instead of a play
which is work
understand?

sure.

jacob used to say to us
we don't work
none of us work
and he's right
but he used to feel righter
understand?

sure.

things mean things
art does and all that
and taking care of each other
and love
these all mean things
we're not just trapped animals
with freakish brains
spinning on a ball of mud
killing each other for no reason at all
things mean things

right?

i am on a bed
in kelowna
with my ipod on
my laptop on
connected!
all the infotainment-pornmation-socialintercon
warming my thighs
what does it mean?

it's time to be useful
be useful to something or someone
even if its yourself
something that means something
to you
or someone who means something
to you

something bigger than you
like a sasquatch or a universe

or an idea
of a hope

when you are wearing headphones and everyone is asleep
it's easy to feel like
you are
floating
alone

they think it's quiet
but you know the truth
is much louder

the school matinee
went fine
kids like it when you swear
and we do
a lot
in this play
in all my plays
i don't even notice
my own foul mouth

opening night
went real good
blah blah blah

teched all day
held the show for fifteen minutes
so we could tech some more
seat of our teeth
skin of our pants

sometimes
people program lighting boards
and then save the work wrong
cost = five hours
that scott will never get back

then we did the show
went real good
blah blah blah

yay democrats
hola ortega
latin is left
stephen colbert remains funny
harper offered to blow me
a long time ago
in a library

tell people

this morning ducks were at my window
they wanted popcorn
they got some
well, pop corn twists
by old dutch
that counts


i hope

intelligent lights
can be tricky
when not your own
they might be wired wrong

we did a line run
then had a three hour break

we walked the streets of kelowna
shopped at the wonderful consignment place
with its reds and stars
saw the chachkas
"welcome to my garden"
carved in stone
at least something is

but then, the art

there's these galleries and they are just chock full of awesome art
these people are rich and have gathered beautiful things to themselves
wouldn't you?

there is PST there

the gallery owners speak of many buyers from Alberta
spending dripping bags of black gold

but the art
twisted metal terminator two sculpture for geeks like me
shopping cart studies from vancouver
fat businessmen in bronze, in crowds, with tiny little heads
flashy landscape, improbably colored, lively

I loved the most the
porcelin busts of children in dunce caps with lizards with sayings carved in their flesh with children bursting cheerfully from their sides and slugs with the faces of babies

i don't do it justice

i will buy a small peice of it
it's all i can afford but i can't afford not to

i saw a group of seven painted outside the period when they were considered a part of the group of seven so it was only worth forty five thousand dollars, instead of a million
poor thing

i ate some yam soup
read a GQ
?uestlove continues to rock it old school
TV is talking about itself
large tie knots are in
it remains fashionable to be rich and thin and young and naked

now i am a little drunk
tommorrow i am called at 2 PM

and then we open


i miss jania
i am listening to Ben Harper
thinking sappily and happily
of beautiful her

now a drum solo is playing
i downloaded a bunch one day
they litter my iTunes
but i don't clean up
this one is Carl Palmer
he is quite skilled

i should sleep
but i'll probably watch a show
blackstar is blowing my mind and slowing up my typing

did you notice?
i should sleep

kelowna

kelowna is warmer
than edmonton
and presumably winnipeg
the air is moist
the trees are huge
and still green
i am small
and experienced
a willow weeps
down the creek from my window
i don't
why should i?

warren sasy kelowna is the victoria
of the okanagan
judging from the age of everyone
i'd say he's right
he's the front of house manager
but he used to be a doctor
his lincoln town car
is leathery and big
not unlike him
it's nice
not unlike him

the motel is from the 70's
furniture-wise
but it has free internet
and microwaves
one is more modern than the other

I am rooming with scott
he is nice
and smokes weed
just like me
we watch a show called weeds
that i downloaded
while high
two crimes at once
and no victoms

unless you count the brain cells
who have a weak lobby group
their protests fall on deafened ears
as my vices goosestep in

the theatre is gorgeous
a new facility
i will rattle alone in my dressing room
like a marble in a shoe box
i will hang out in the ladies
when they are decent
i am the only boy
in the cast
but not on the tour
brad is here
scott too
betty has characteristics of both genders
this is not an insult

the bar is close
the food is good
the portions gigantic
the techs are competent and nice
the theatre is gorgeous
a new facility

the factors align and conspire
to make the tour fun

this poem
beleives in a flat tax
and is against gay marriage
that's why it's over here

on the right

mormons

my name is earl
is a funny show
it's so positive
you should watch it
on rented dvd

because commercials give you cancer

but don't rent at blockbuster
it's run by Mormons
there's no evidence
that Mormons give you cancer
but I have my suspicions

go to the movie studio instead
or the alternative video spot
they are nice
and locally owned

i am locally owned
but i am travelling out of my proprietory area
this very day

waiting for the cab to come
waiting to get on the plane
wating for the plane to land
almost all of travel
is waiting

i am always ambitious
with my spare time
when i am on tour

i imagine hotel rooms
are the best rooms for writing
my play which i haven't been working on
my screenplay
which turns two soon

i have cds and a workbook
to learn Spanish
so i don't have to say:
lo siento
yo no hablo espanol
mi novia habla espanol
habla con mi novia

they are only too happy to

i haven't budgeted for hangovers
and sleeping all day
which i will also do
plus eight shows a week
the maximum allowed
by equity

i am bringing books to read
vernon god little
the posionwood bible
bridget jones
for dessert
it's all dessert
i like dessert

it is time to pack
which i will do badly
never enough socks

the day before

the day before i leave
i install jania's webcam
and sign up for yahoo messenger
it's the only one for me
cause i have a mac
she has a pc

the choice is not political

i not only have plane tickets
i also have a cold
it's in my nose
but keeps trying to leave
in the form of snot

i trap it in kleenexes
which is a brand, not a thing
when brands are really successful
they become the thing

rft will be fine
i made arrangements with joey
and with kevvy
joey i paid
but not kevvy yet

my dad goes away as much as me
sometimes more
we're gonna hang out today
we're a close family
thanks to my brother
and him dying
we're a close family

relatively speaking

i've been watching a hospital show
it makes me want to tell you all
to drive safely
respect your mortality
wear a seat belt
and when possible
a helmet
you are nothing without your big brain
less then nothing

because you will leave a hole

and

don't fall in love with your heart patient
he will die, in the season finale
we never knew what he did for a living
so i feel like i don't know him
jania cried, but i didn't

jania is napping
the fog blots the sky white
like a death on 6 feet under
i am warm
in my sweat clothes
but not sweating
still i deserve them
i bought them with my own money

i am lazy today
because i can be
they say courage is when you are scared
but do it anyway
lazy is when you have energy
but lie around even still
i still am
you know what i mean

but

who cares about james dean anymore
i have his rare TV appearances
on videotape
somebody thought i would like it
i will regift it
next chance i get
if i give it to you
act surprised

that was a tangent
you are a cosign
be obtuse
if you want to

there's a comfort in the air
a contentment
and blueberry muffins
today all the things i wish i was
don't matter
and i see through my own eyes

leaving town

the weekend before you leave town
is the busiest weekend
packing and seeing people and being nice to my girlfriend
so she misses me

instead of not

the weekend for me is busier than for some
because i have rehearsal
and a million improv shows
besides i always pack badly
forgetting something
never enough socks

i don't know when my plane is
or where my hotel is
but i am sharing a cab
to save the theatre money

the play changed a little
why not?
the actors are the same
but we changed a little
who wouldn't?

we throw a new football on the breaks
Shamus ate the old one
during Faithless
which is a different play

it toured too
to different cities
why not?

i am glad to get out of town
it is a small and sticky place
but i will miss my girlfriend

instead of not

late

after the party
my girlfriend is sleeping
i do things quietly
in the living room
there's a show we're watching
on rented dvd
she's an episode ahead
so i get to watch
and then bed

tired

no matter how little i work
i am tired at the end
i just want to smoke pot
and watch things with my friends

edmonton mornings
are so fucking cold
it takes hitpoints off me
and changes my attitude
which wasn't good anyway
everyone looks dorky
in their hats and parkas
it's a fashion equalizer
there's christmas and fun
winter isn't all dead homeless
but i hate hockey
and i don't ski
so what does winter offer me?

the new thing

is that i am not going to blog about my life or my feelings or anything i am doing or whether or not it is great.

just assume that it is, and that i am in varying degrees of inebriation, doubt, fun, social anxiety and lower back pain.

until further notice: poetry, mostly bad.