East Van Places represented in poetry

So on to my second self published book ("A Cure for Mirrors") from my pre transition era. This book also had a nice launch, as did Like Bukowski in Drag, which i launched once at the Bar called Bukowski's, but is now The Charlatan. Bukowski's was a great for a bar venue in the late nineties, early aughties for poetry, open mics. Local legend CR Avery did some of his very first shows there, most events were run but the Late T. Paul Ste. Marie, who was the best emcee I ever worked with. Someone sorely missed in the scene. RIP Paul.

I have very fond memories of those open mics, and seeing so many friends and great poets every week.

Anyway, my second book, which launched at the more recently disappeared cafe "the Prophouse"... a great evening with local musicians Rodney Decroo, and Wyckham Porteous, opening up for me, they opened for ME. So humbled by that to this day.

A Cure For Mirrors also is inhabited by places of the past, nostalgia. Though written when I lived in these places, now these pieces are nostalgic for me, and evoke stronger memories than even looking at old photos of "The Ship of Love" aka The Santa Rosa, (a block west of Main, on Broadway) where I lived on the 3rd floor with my friends Vince, Andrew, Hersh, and a myriad of short term others... ah Early 90's Mt. pleasant. real grit, not hipster grit. All those hipster restaurants, back in the day (early 90's) were Chinese Canadian greasy spoons, with big booths mostly and cheap greasy breakfasts all day, and usually the worst coffee you ever had. Worse than Bino's. Seriously.

Living in that building, I occupied the bedroom because everyone else came and went kind of willy nilly, and often I had the place to myself, and then there were 6 of us, etc... we were so young. I had a great view of the Lee Building, which was pretty run down back then. The events of In Mt. Pleasant are poetic interpretations of something I saw one of those nights I was there alone.

In Mt. Pleasant

in
  those mountains   over   there
some clouds  have landed   and
a short rain
is making   it's 
                way 
through trees
              sloping
                     into boulders
and falling
           towards
                  vancouver

often in my   dreams   i am
                            that woman:
the rain walks
              across my face
                            as i run   my
fingers   in the
                gutter of my   bedroom
                                window

in my dreams   often i am that
                              woman
                            in among
transformers   and high voltage lines   cables
she   is a black haida   shouting   distance
                           out   of her mind
and
   bent
       on hearing a man called                                      
                              "Darren"   
sing for her    
            she's high
            from ground   
where fire fighters baffle her noise
in
   the
   narrow 
   alley   
she's over 

...while all are busy saving   her
                               from
straddlingscreaming spirits
                            and a whole
                            city block
worth of electric   power:
                          a man   four floors                  
                                       above       
                                       her is
on his fire   escape chanting   
dressed in nothing
but horsenails and suede voices   
dust falls    down away  from 
his fingers   through gridworked iron and black
into   her shingled hair   
making
           waves
                     inside   her ears and
clearing cleaning   
                          sad spirits from
                                     scraping 
                                     scratching
and       
hanging
       on   for that one man   who isn't a fireman   but
a song 
     of   kissing "Darren"  
                   harder than teeth
and black as Indian
                   saving her   slow like flesh   
or a dream
in my sleep   often i am that   woman often   as
it's
raining in 

           Mount Pleasant .

© 1992 Josie Boyce (Published in 2008, "A Cure For Mirrors" under the name Joe Boyce Burgess)

The second poem is something based "the experience" I had at a party I went to in the mid-late nineties at a well known spot that hosted great house parties. so much booze, so many drugs. But always good times. All my memories of these parties are gauzy and candy coloured, even that time I almost OD'd on shrooms and ingesting pot, okay, and drinking well over a dozen beers... the poem is not about that night, but a similar less yellow eyed, liver killing night at the same house, a house I recall with much fondness, as all I ever did there was party. It's called "Spiders and Wolves."


Spiders & Wolves

it is 
one of those parties 
at Fish's 
where
the mushrooms 
glow along my 
vegetable of a tongue
& i watch 
the road fill with 
spiders and wolves 
            
         : i think :

my older than 
               old hands 
are frosty

moonlight sculpture 
                 evaporates
into scripture 
(under my drunk) laughter 

foolish boy that i am i
mishandle rites 
of ignorant solitude
          
       : i think :

you’ve got to breathe 
lime through teeth
you’ve got to breathe 

flatten the music 
that’s it.

Try flashy half empty 
attempts to get 
lost in catacombs 
of supple men 
        
        : i drink : 

i sink
my dream of 
teeth into
wolves that taste
all cold & 

             spidery.

© 1997 Josie Boyce (Published in 2008, "A Cure For Mirrors" under the name Joe Boyce Burgess)


The third poem I am showcasing from "A Cure For Mirrors," is called "A Ghost In Prayer" and is dedicated to a great old house I lived in, again with a few friends, but not quite as many,we were all a bit older, crankier. My gender dysphoria was at an all time depressing level around this time, and I tried a lot of different masks on, and I consumed too much of everything, from food to booze to drugs, to comic books, and collectibles,

I ended up with no job, and a humongous visa and student loan debt, that eventually i had to flee to japan to pay most of it off. I did make some great friends at that house, of room mates, and folks passing through, there were two little corner grocers nearby that I loved, we had some awesome cats there, and also, the place was pretty haunted. whether you believe in ghosts, or have some other explanation for the freaky shit I experienced, what i got out of it, was an empathy for those still clinging to places they lived and died.

One experience I had, coming to the landing up the stairs, i saw this poem down the end of the hall next to my room.

A Ghost in Prayer 
(for 909 Windermere)

a cloudless blue dress 
sweeps past winter

at night 
she cries out
bottles and glasses dance
spinning dust into song 

she drinks these 
whiskey elegies as 
long papery shoulders 
slump in a corner

she wakes the living

she shivers low echoes

long dead teardrops
for her dying man already 
a ghost before he disappeared 
in the fog of her arms

she mourns 
being stripped bare
and killed by 
her own watery voice

a cloudless blue dress 
falls away 


dry as prayer 

© 2001 Josie Boyce (Published in 2008, "A Cure For Mirrors" under the name Joe Boyce Burgess)

Hmm I enjoyed doing the little historical bits between poems. i think I will try to keep that up. See what happens when you do something, something else happens!

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