It’s shocking, but shouldn’t be, and sad for no other reason than of all the streets in Toronto, I am most familiar with Queen Street West.
   I have no roots in this city but, after moving here five years ago, spent my spare moments of summer photographing the sights of Queen. It was a way of familiarizing myself with my new home.
   I discovered Queen West is more than a street and far more than a neighbourhood. With all the shopping and dining, it is a street that seems to run 24-hours a day.
   Except lately.
   This street, like so many streets in Canada and beyond, is silent. The street is all but empty. Businesses locked down, storefronts are boarded up, and the restaurants that are open offer only take away. Parking is not a problem today.
   It is not business as usual.
   We don’t know how long this will last, but we know it needs time to heal.
   This is not what we expected.
   The face of the city is changing: it always has and always will.
   How will we change with it?

Wealth Walks And Poverty Sleeps

click above for a look at Queen West five years ago

   Wednesday sits naked
           and ordinary
               waiting

   between the bookends of social Saturday
   and restive Sunday. The day is
         little more

   than a cluster of hours or a stop on the
   treadmill. Indecisive and
        lonely

   nobody chooses a Wednesday. Nothing
   happens
             on a Wednesday

   and it’s the same each week.

© 2014 j,g, lewis

Take these humble hearts,
those who trust, perchance, too much,
the ones who now shelter themselves
from the agony which lingers
from trying; from hoping; from
believing there could be more.
 
Heathens, yes, for lack of a more apt word
but neither an infidel, nor a fool.
Where trust is too much, there is faith
without discretion. There remains a
longing few can see, or realize,
for they need to believe.
 
See these unwilling victims
not for what they have not been, but for
each tiny gesture, shameless notion, and
act of empathy, however inferred.
Allow them to create, leave them
to their ways. Let them be.
 
Teach them, these broken souls,
not to look for the lesson, but to accept
the graceless guidance oft shone into
clotted shadows. Knowingly they will
expand and contract in self-preservation,
self-examination, and sorrow.
 
It is there, in seclusion, where errors in
understanding take on perspective. There,
those humble hearts, may come back
to being. Each carries a pulse. They bleed
silently and remorsefully. They have loved
you before, and may again.
 

©2017 j.g. lewis

The radio no longer crackles
as it used to do
with
the lightening,
as
it happens.
Through the darkness
a voice calls out, Pagliaro singing to the broken and the lame.
Rain, rain,
rain showers.

The radio crackled in the night
sharp-edged static
then a stinging silence
before the thunder,
not but a few heartbeats.
The sky
opens up.
Thunder and lightening, touches the earth, as you feel shame.
Rain, rain,
rain showers.

The radio plays to the lonely
as it always has.
The moon
cowers behind vengeful clouds.
She, partially broken, is vulnerable
like you.
Still not there.
Unable to protect, as you thought she could, from all the pain.
Rain, rain,
rain showers.

The radio no longer crackles
across the airwaves.
Emotions, still fragile,
Shatter
in the rain.
No one is to blame.
Strengthen my faith.
Let me live again. No longer broken, no longer tame. Not again.
Rain, rain,
rain showers.


© 2015 j.g. lewis

They don’t make radios, or write songs, like they did in 1971. Michel Pagliaro still rocks

I light a candle to illuminate
thoughts this world holds. Some
I cannot understand,
others simply trying to land
but hover instead. And this song
keeps playing in my head.

I can’t find my way home.

I feel there will be no peace,
not now, not among this culture
of shame and blame.
Not when you question others,
but refuse to question yourself.
Still I light a candle.

I can’t find my way home.

Just beyond the candlelight, I
watch days slip into night, amidst
a maelstrom of discontent,
you never know what is meant.
Look over your shoulder. Look
further through your past.

I can’t find my way home.

Fistfuls of violence, mouthfuls
of reality escape. Thoughts which
should not be free, peace
should not be a luxury. I strike
a match to light up a candle,
to shine a light for hope.

I can’t find my way home.

©2017 j.g. lewis

APRIL is POETRY MONTH

Take a poem to lunch