Crossing with Tiff

Abstract

When I was invited to be part of Tiff's celebration, I wanted to write something new that came directly from his work. I reread Not Wanted on the Voyage, one of the most delightful and darkest novels in Canadian literature, and wrote two poems as a result. There were dozen of images that resounded and wouldn't let me go, but being limited for time, I chose two: Mrs Noyes, waking from sleepwalking, finds she is stroking the forehead of a weeping bear; after the rains have stopped, Ham, his mother and Mottyl stand on the deck of the ark, the moon and stars visible for the first time in days.On the plane from Vancouver to Toronto, I reread The Piano Man's Daughter and tried to write a kind of ghazal that pulled actual phrases from the novel that I pieced together and sometimes expanded or used as springboards to something else (as in the ending three lines). And finally, at the conference banquet Bill told the wonderful story of losing Tiff on Salt Spring Island. He set out to find him and there he was in the middle of the road, stopping traffic. A slug was crossing. When I got home, I couldn't resist using that marvellous anecdote, that so sums up Tiff's generosity and care, in a poem.Woman with BearsNoah's wife steppedinto the pungent dark. Sleep-walking, when she wokeshe was strokingthe wide forehead of a bear.The bear was weeping, its muzzle wet,its mate a denser darknessbehind her in the cage.What to do but keep on strokingtill the animal lowered its headto her lap and closed its eyes.She, too, and when she woke again,a bear slept on either side.One could be death, the othertenderness. She thought of herfirstborn son, killed at her breastfor his hairy arms, his wet fur head;one could be pity, the other desire.She thought of her husband,smooth and hard in their bed;one could be terror, the othergrace. Could she rise withoutdisturbing such a sleep,wade into the world as it had been,bears in the woods pawing berries,tongues purple and plush,she on the porch with Mottyl in her lap,the boy curled in her womb's watery cage,his small mouth opening. One could beforgiveness; the other, memory.Nothing resembles what this one knows.(first appeared in Nimrod International Journal of Prose and Poetry)On the Ark, The First Night of StarsHe stood with his motheron the deck, Mottyl in her arms.Everything gleamed from the coldscrubbing of the rain, its handsnot smallafter all, the moon finallyvisible, doubled in Mottyl'sblue-white eyes.He wondered if the catcould sense it there,wondered if it changed anythingshe couldn't see.Charlie's Poem (from The Piano Man's Daughter)Things pushing up to heaven,others bending down to hell.And in between the livingwalking sideways on the earth. Crablike,crowlike, the charred ankle-wingedglide of lovers: Ede and the Piano Man,Lily and Pan, Lily and Ned; in our own way,dare I say, my mother Lily and me.She said, I was struck like a match,I had no option but to burn.The cornet, flute, harp, sackbut,psaltery, dulcimer, all kinds of musicshall fall down. …