Upper CanLit Village

Nicholas Lomonosoff

Under the viaduct, past the lock blockhouse
The road runs – through and beyond beauty;
A road knows not to overstate its usefulness,
Not to bring disfiguring business in its wake.
So, no Canadian Tire, no John Deere dealership
In slick, soldierly machinery mars perfection.
This is peace. You wouldn’t understand.

A municipal bylaw states that bicycles
Are allowed, but not skateboards: these tend to gash
Spontaneity’s spark from Heaven’s grid. Pity the angels,
Sullen and indentured, baseball caps on backward,
Serving stale ambrosia to puzzled strangers.

Americans and French Canadians are
Welcome here, but not for too long. They might disturb
The seller of rare, first editions, the Royal
Canadian Legion, the faux-Scottish
Hotel bar where the locals sip, shoulders locked,
Arcane, defensive as a game of dominos.

Paintings by local artists: talent
As halitosis, no radical belch
Of abstract genius here, Newman, Rothko
Not even smelled on the wind. The dry-goods store
Exudes stuff from the old country, Chivers
Orange marmalade, Heinz’s tinned treacle,
O-Can-a-dandy ripe with pimples oozing
Through the grille of the priest’s box, our adolescent
Nation confessing the culinary sins of the dad.

Off Main, gift stores bristle with
Christmas ornaments, snowmen with carrot noses
And catatonic smiles, all made in China
Or the Philippines, washed up on the banks
Of the canal like bubbles of hard labor.
Nearby, a condom fetches up against
A yacht called “Lady Di II,” royalty saluting
The moon from where she’s moored at By Bridge, one
    thing
Straining after another, the Three Amigos
Of faint, white hope in a town not given to symbols.