I must have that kind
of face: everywhere
I go people always stop
me for directions
I tell tourists how to get to Kensington Market
for wild blueberry pie, vintage bags and ganja,
workman’s clothes and secondhand guitars and
the reggae, the djembe, the flaming gay parade and
ugli fruit in the Marcus Garvey sweltering summer.
I tell them it’s Spa-DYNA not Spa-DEENA and
if anyone asks me 你能給我指路嗎? I can point
the way
I must look like someone who knows south
from east and where the streetcars stop and where
there’s a good place for cheap vegan lunch though
I am detached, a hovering illusion watching over
Augusta Ave like a billboard with floodlit smiles for
a Vietnamese dental clinic because there’s nowhere
else I come from and nowhere else
to go
When you’re lost inside there is no screaming
red arrow on a map >>> YOU ARE HERE!
When you’re a broken flower that’s lost its scent,
nectar drained and pollen strewn, you no longer
attract the honey bee, you pick through the fallen
petals, crumpled, torn and purple bruised and maybe
the remnants of trail will lead you
back home
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