Shocked but not shocked

An online article (at https://www.vancouverisawesome.com/2018/03/29/breastfeeding-hockey-player-canada/) prompted me to write this short piece.

Breastfeeding in Public

A hockey player feels the wrath of the uninitiated;
Men and woman alike complain.
For shame that you should treat a mother’s touch
with such anger and abuse.
Grow up and see as all as human beings,
not as sexual objects of the greedy or
sacrifices of the religious right.
It’s 2018 and it’s time for you to change.


© 2018 Catherine Woods

Fruit of my labours after attending Room 2018 workshops

Prompts are so useful when the muse isn't visiting.

Objects

After Fanny Howe’s Out There

Manitoba is a street in East Van
Ontario is a street in East Van
Quebec is a street in East Van

A province is a province is a province

One seagull
Two seagulls
Four seagulls dive-bomb laneway garbage bins

Iron gates block you out of everything 

Iron gates hold you into the reality that is East Van

A palm tree

A bamboo

Separated by a road, a store, eternity, all time

A photographer takes many photos

Of two young women in front of a green door

Two jars of pickled beets on the sidewalk

capture the attention

of passersby (namely me)

reminding us of grannies and

smelly kitchens in 1973

© Catherine Woods 2018

The Feather

Along the beach

the water laps,

stones litter,

a single feather (crow, I think)

lies

gracefully,

a diamond among

particles of yellow sand,

a dream among

nightmares inching round,

a sweetness among

the salty coastal waters

of the Salish Sea.

A caw retains its seriousness,

permits a secret,

bring forth my attention

to this place,

quiet,

still,

almost death-like,

nearly sleeping,

solitary

in its oneness,

black

in its colour,

calling me and others,

but only I hear its song,

the others are deaf

to its caw.

Maybe the ancestors 

left it here,

a bridge to past injustices,

a bridge to hope intuitive,

a calm before the storm.

© Catherine Woods 2018

We're doing a really bad job ....

Caretakers

We are the caretakers, and bad ones at that. We’re lazy and apathetic,
leaving dog poop on other people lawns and using plastic grocery bags.
We can’t even take good care of our own bodies that are filled with toxins
and cancers and parts that are even biological. We’ve become stupid with time
instead of learning to all live in harmony. We’re killing our home and each other, and
we don’t seem to want to fix the problem. Whoever left us here to take care of this utopia
is going to be very angry when they get back and see what we did.

We were very bad caretakers. We didn’t learn a thing.


© 2018 Catherine Woods