I refuse
the straight black line of rage,
the run of moments
not fully lived,
and even at the best of times
a fear of ends, delusion,
hardly a spin
on the carousel of morning
before God the barker
calls the next ride
I am circling the world
like a moon, flaunting
my sunlit face, my roundness
above the flat blue planes of sky
I refuse all other geometry,
vow that in the end
mine will be
a long pure spark of waking
eye to eye with the stars
This poem “Autobiography” originally appeared in 25th Anniversary Issue. Spec. issue of Canadian Literature 100 (Spring 1984): 318.
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