the end of a house

within three violent days of desecration,

the house next door was completely gone

- now a non-narrative of airy dampness,

loose earth, rocks, and broken bricks...

 christmas colours before the denudation -

 and 60 years of a family's history reduced to

tossed out rags and shattered glass,

twisted metal and crushed plants...

a house so cherished with handbuilt attainment, 

faithfully maintained through the seasons -

the love-red paint on trims and cupboard doors,

worn adirondack chairs and aging hearts...

the rolled up vinyl mat that covered the back perch,

tossed down to question the endless nulling void

- the lives forever lived, the memories neutralized,

the dreams evaporated, the voices silenced...

like a screaming pot, the chimney flue lies in vain,

no more secret papers smoking through its hollow

- it will soon be buried with the porcelain bowls, 

the faceless mirrors and the almost inconsolable... 

a small house of quick feasts and fissures, 

a silent house of desert photos and smuggled cacti,

of silver souvenir spoons and old board games

played out on the lifespan of a round table top...

 so many hours and days and years assigned

to the timely tending and the feckless defending -

and then it is all over, all move on and out

of near sight, not even the hatchet remains...

the century old cherry tree in the backyard

reduced years ago to double doubting trunks -

still reached for the wintry skies, yet knowing

that it will never see the spring again...

a christmas epilogue to 1645 east 14th avenue, home to the mcmurray family for sixty years
 

ann's house:: emptying out

a bare rod and two wire hooks
in an empty closet where the

orange carpet has not faded

 white cotton sheets shield the
emptied shelves where fruits in

mason jars were once stacked

in the rec room a few boxes of
old board games sit on a counter

above the now empty cupboards

 the bar shelves where bottles stood

and glasses perched, some to be

filled on those cold empty nights

 the lone lamp left stranded on the
paneled wall glows a forlorn survey
to soft lit the quiet emptied room

the twin beds up in the attic room
are for sale, along with the three
bedside tables long emptied out

strewn on top of a shag rug are
some old frames and scrapbooks

emptied of photos and memories

 two empty vases at a dollar apiece

wait to be filled with bouquets again

bright as the one painted on the tray

the dull red basement door is locked,
bolted and barred as always, even

while the house is emptying all out

Ann and her late husband Lou had lived in this house for 60 years - 60 years of cumulative belongings to empty out, to eviscerate piece by piece to the best offer of the nostalgic gatherers, the predatory collectors, the ambivalent deal seekers... [addendum: in the end, what did not sell was trucked away by junk removers who charged Ann much more than she ever paid for any of it brand new]

When the house is emptied of the last chair, lamp, book, picture, ornament, tool, memory - will it remain to be re-modelled and refilled with new chairs, lamps, books - or will it die in a dusty heap of splintered wood, crushed doors and shattered glass... [addendum: it died a most destructive death, the whole lot obliterated in a day except for the single holly tree on the southeast corner, and now, a dull red duplex with cream trims has replaced the old white house with the bright red trims]

I preserve a few images of this home in memory of Lou who built everything in it, who tended the garden meticulously, whose paintbrush was ever handy for a fresh coat, and who died in his own house - never having to see it now, in its sadly empty state... [addendum: all gone now, wiped out and replaced like it had never been there...how quickly the memory clicks off and long lives dissipate]

marking my clark park:: part VII

 under the almost summer sun, the portuguese congregation winds slowly past Clark Park in their annual father's day procession...

girl angels float by with their stiff over-sized wings,

followed by the flower-emblazoned litter bearing Lady Fatima...

 and the faithful band plays on, aiming for the lateral shade of the weeping willow down the hill before turning towards the home church on East 13th...

the vines remain...for now...

A generation's worth of summers tending to the meticulously trained vines on trellises that span the length of a standard city lot...

A verdant canopy of an urban vineyard to supply a family with enough grapes to crush into a few dozen bottles of home-made wine a year...

This season's bounty will not be harvested by the same family anymore - the house has been sold and who knows if the new owners are wine lovers, grape eaters, pruning enthusiasts...

I have walked by this suspended viticultural endeavour [at the corner of Victoria Drive and the East 14th laneway] on the way to Trout Lake [John Hendry Park] for almost three decades now and have always admired the enduring dedication in the maintenance of their elevated grape production and their old world attitude towards using their whole property - including the space above their land - to yield what they need...

the house sits empty now, the grass unmowed... but the vines thrive on without the hands that have known them for so long, and even without the required sunshine hours so sadly lacking in this non-summer of ours...

 a left behind concrete table that would have known many a bottle and cluttered glasses and bearing stains from more then a few spilled drops...

the path to the [almost wine-coloured!] front door of the large Vancouver Special house is edged by sedum-filled pots fashioned from cut opened rubber tires...

when I walked by on the weekend, I spied the clusters of green grapes dangling demurely from the tangle of vines and leaves, their pulp slowly sweetening in the already fall-like sunshine...
in the garage where the large wooden barrels would have been rolled out in anticipation of the juice to be fermented, renovation work is underway - and I was hesitant to ask if this expansive grape arbour will remain, not wanting to know the negative response...

marking my clark park:: part I

Clark Park...

where the buffaloes had once roamed...

where the salmon swam up a small creek...

where orchards fruited in the summer...

where Jean still lives in the house she was born in almost 80 years ago...

and remembers the crazy Russian family that ruffled the neighbourhood...

where we breathe in the green air from the old trees day in and day out...

and walk its shaded and meandering pathways...

and gather windfall branches for winter solstice warmth 

for many, many years now...

all because of a generous man named Clark who donated the land in 1889...