Rates Of Passage

Two hundred years ago a trip across the Atlantic would have meant over a month on a creaky, leaky sailing vessel with no guarantees. Young arrogant adventurers facing constant peril One hundred and twenty years ago My grandfather’s westward passage on a steamship took five or six days ...Without return passage... He was a young man leaving home For the unknown I am hurtling east across the great Atlantic in a cramped and sometimes shaky silver bullet. This flight takes around six hours. Unsure if the shrinking planet will survive Another century At this rate.

Treasures

What a push/pull

pressure cooker day

everybody feeling

the squeeze

I can’t move

for the elephants

taking all

the comforts

values clashed,

considered

considered selling

my favourite posession

everything dear to me

is worth more

than can be paid

treasures to pass on

(March 1, 2014.)

Uh oh..... There Goes The Neighbourhood

Griffintown could be any neighbourhood at all

I’ve lived long enough to watch many communities fall

people moving up, people driven out

running from the renos and the condos and the wrecking ball

uh oh…..make way for the bobos

uh oh…..the champagne socialists

uh oh…..make way for those bourgeois bohemians

uh oh…..there goes the neighbourhood

immigrants and artists living side by side 

eking out a living and preserving their cultural style

cleaning up their corner, their side of the street

filling up their space with personal and civic pride

uh oh…..make way for the bobos

uh oh…..the champagne socialists

uh oh…..make way for those bourgeois bohemians

uh oh…..there goes the neighbourhood

when the gentry comes, the rents will soar

all the local colour won’t be there any more

when the gentry comes is when the colour goes

you’ll still have a face, but you cut off your nose

immigrants and artists both have economic insecurity

so they move into neighbourhoods sick with urban decay

they defibrilate before it gets too late and

pull the neighbourhood out of obscurity

uh oh…..make way for the bobos

uh oh…..the champagne socialists

uh oh…..make way for those bourgeois bohemians

uh oh…..there goes the neighbourhood

then the vultures come and kick you out of your homes

as they buy up everything in sight

when the vultures come they’ll strip you downt to the bone

bleach you away and treat you like blight

I used to live in a place like this because the rents were cheap

I had to move because it sold and the rent got steep

to hell with artsy romance, it’s all about finance

what you get to skim you get to keep

uh oh…..make way for the bobos

uh oh…..the champagne socialists

uh oh…..make way for those bourgeois bohemians

uh oh…..there goes the neighbourhood

some yuppies moved here because the streets were cool and quaint

the yuppies got older and now…the same streets ain’t

their bourgois aspirations belied their intentions

and now the bar downstairs is closed due to their complaints

uh oh…..make way for the bobos

uh oh…..the champagne socialists

uh oh…..make way for those bourgeois bohemians

uh oh…..there goes the neighbourhood

when the gentry comes, the rents will soar

all the local colour won’t be there any more

when the gentry comes is when the colour goes

you’ll still have a face, but you cut off your nose

some motherfuckers bought up five whole city blocks

said they’d look after everyone, but that was a crock

with their lululementality they destroyed a community

now with impunity we see it’s true that money talks (and walks)

when the bobos come you’ll be on the run

from their phony pseudo psych mentality

when the bobos come you’ll be on the run

from their virtual spirituality

when th bobos come you’ll be on the run

from their actual banality

uh oh…..make way for the bobos

uh oh…..the champagne socialists

uh oh…..make way for those bourgeois bohemians

uh oh…..there goes the neighbourhood

mid-summer

Fireflies flicker in the thicket at dusk

Winking in the warm breathless night

Little beacons luring mates or prey

Being neither, I delight in their display

I heard there were more this year

This evening bears that out

Sequins on the lawn 

before the dew settles

A week of calm before 

the Cicadas arrive to crow

The slow decline of summer

And the next turn of the page

My Heart Was Built For Breaking

January 21, 2013 at 10:33 PM

Ian Hanchet

It's better to have a broken heart

than to have an unspoken part

To love in life is to do your part

So never stop believing

It's better to have loved and lost

Even at such a saline cost

than to cover up your heart in frost

Just because she's leaving

And even though it's aching

And to get through days I'm faking

It's love I still be making

This heart was built for breaking.

©2013 IGH

Mum

There was nothing left
Before she left
Erosion stole her
And there was nothing
I could do for her
That birthed me 
And fed 
and sheltered
And comforted 
And clothed
And listened
And held
And taught
And scolded
And worried
And most of all
Loved.
"Hush little baby
Don't you cry,
You know your mama
Was born to die....
All my trials, lord
Soon be over"

There goes my home

Paradise is burning

It's been burning all day

Like the sacking of Rome 

Or the burial of Pompeii

There goes my home

Like Hiroshima flattened

Or Atlantis drowned

Don't care how it happened

Gotta Get out of town

There goes my home

This boom town went bust

And The rats had already fled

In God We Trusted

And Now we're all dead

There goes my home

Everything's burned 

burnedto the ground

everything’s lost, 

there’s nothing to be found

There goes my home

There's more plagues to endure

There's no way to prepare

There's nothing to insure

The system is burnt bare

There goes my home