The Organ Player, St. Joseph’s Oratory
Lucinda is in love
Every Sunday she goes to the free afternoon concert
to see his oversized image
on the big screen in the basilica
She sits in the pew
her eyes locked on the alternating images
his hands, the back of his head
his profile, his feet
His hair, like a lion’s mane, black unruly
the Roman profile, the lips that purse at every crescendo
his hands, red and inelegant
that become the wands of inexplicable magic
as they race across the keys
She feels beads of perspiration
imagines those fingers on her
her body electric with desire
And his feet
oh his feet
as they select the pedals with such certainty
the pointed-toed shoes and colourful striped socks
the one sign of vanity
arresting her
Lucinda holds her head in her hands
to Bach’s Toccata, adagio & fugue in D minor
At Pizza Vesuvio, Champs Élysées
On this patio we let the wind
undo our hair
around us Cartier Bulgari Lancel
herds of tourist shopping bags
a man in a wheelchair one leg amputated
war veteran perhaps
rolls up to a mother and daughter
waves his hands behind the girl as the mother takes a photo
for just a moment I have admiration
think he is the father
think what a strong family to endure
such hardship but they
look at him stunned
as he laughs rolls away
we go back to our pizza
wind undoing our hair
Mutt on the Saguenay River
He barks on the shoreline as they search the beach
during low tide. He’s excited by what’s
beneath the water. His yelps are drawn-out groans—
if only he could see this landscape, these creatures
as he swipes his paws against the cool spray.
Now he sinks in pewter-coloured clay,
wishes for crabs that hide in the half-light.
CAROLYNE VAN DER MEER lives and writes in Montreal, Canada. She has two published books, Motherlode: A Mosaic of Dutch Wartime Experience (Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2014) and Journeywoman (Inanna, 2017). A third book, a collection of poetry called Sensorial, is forthcoming from Inanna in 2021. Her poetry and prose have been published internationally.
Copyright © 2019 by Carolyne Van Der Meer. All rights reserved.