Poem of the Week

"I needed a genre for the times I go phantom. I needed a genre to rampage Liberty, haunt the foul freedom of silence. I needed a genre to pry loose Liberty from an impacted marriage with the soil. I needed a genre to gloss my ancestress' complicity . . ."
—Lisa Robertson, XEclogue (1993)

I need a gloss for the silence implicit in my legacy
for phantom Liberty standing bridal at my harbor
I need a gauze to slow the hemorrhaging of my history
I need an ancestor complicit in my undercover prying

I need soil that whirls and spirals upward somewhere else
I need dustbowl, sand dune, dustdevils for roots
I need the border-crossing eye of a tornado
I need an ancestor fleeing into Canada

to rampage freedom there or keep on fleeing
to keep on fleeing or invent a genre
to distemper ideology