Seasonal Sonnets: Five Guidelines for My Death
I. Should It Happen in Spring
Then bury me in the salty sea, or among the ice
floes of Hillsborough. See the teenagers out there
who play with their poles, leaping recklessly
from shard to shard. I was once among them.
There is a secluded grove near Lewis Point
where, at our adolescence’s dawning, we’d sneak in
to watch older kids fuck in their cars.
Beyond that place is the river, its stench in
spring rising like invisible cumulus. This is winter
giving up the ghost. Take me out in a
boat, drop me overboard. Watch my corpse
vanish into the whorls of the estuary.
Afterward, go home. Stay up late.
Take your dick in your hand. Watch Bleu Nuit.
II. Should It Happen in Summer
Then don’t let my body leave the boundaries
of Halifax; no pilgrimages to Stewiake.
Hold my funeral in the Public Gardens
among the duck feces and weeping willows.
Tell my guests they’re staying at the
Lord Nelson. Tell them to wear galoshes,
even if it doesn’t rain.
The procession should go down SGR, but
make sure we pass the Waverly Inn.
Hold the reception on a patio.
Tell my guests to drink pilsners in
the sun, to eat cool salads.
Don’t mention I once wrote
this city’s soul in water.
III. Should It Happen in Autumn
You’d think cremation an obvious choice—
reds and oranges, flaming yellows,
—but you’d be wrong. This city has never seen
plumes of annihilation in its clear autumnal skies.
Think about the vast Ballardian suburbs that
surround Toronto like a crust. Now there’s a death
I can’t abide; I imagine it without dénouement.
But I know I’m wrong. Every leaf clings to its branch:
the vermilion curdle, the break of its stem from
the weight of not living. If I die in this megalopolis,
I’ll do a pirouette as I give up my branch
and join those anonymous piles of fallen foliage.
If I do, invite exactly 401 guests to my funeral.
Commute them in from Oshawa and Milton.
IV. Should It Happen in Winter
Then the food you serve will be key.
Windows will rattle in angst, the windiest
intersection in Canada beyond their panes.
Winter here is a paradigm. Like Pembina Highway, it
accomplishes a fathomless length. The irony of death
is a fridge. Preserve my body with coolants
until the ground softens enough to slip me in.
This town’s heart, like a woman’s, is forked:
The first thing I felt here was the nip of
frostbite on my thumb.
The second was your breath.
It brushed my ear through the phone.
At the wake, serve thick stews and black beer.
Search for traces of me once the snow melts.
V. Should It Happen in Some In-between Season
You’ll know it by the angle of snow squalls in May,
or the abrupt cool that descends on that lake in
Hanoi. You’ll realize the season when blizzards
touch down during summer in Australia, when
a twister rips through Quebec Street in Guelph.
Show the air no mercy when it betrays you;
hide your body behind thick coats in June,
or waggle your Speedo in November’s face.
The last breath from my lungs will be tepid
and sour, clam chowder recollections of a
visit to L’Ardoise, where July awakes each
morning to frost on the grass.
Make no mistake about these transgressions:
They’re my fault. Burn me in effigy.
