You Love Me

by DeVotchKa


Canada, Oh Canada!

Surrounded by bending pine in Canada
these trees speak to my hands.
I listen nonetheless caught in rapt awe, attention
engrossed in their conversation.
We talk of religion, naturally and novel interpretation.
The trees here whisper to my tar-covered palms
that Holden Caulfield wants to know
where the ducks go in the winter.
I want to know where Walt Whitman came from,
eying me on this tree's shoulder. The surprise tumbled
me off, the bastard.
I'm on a quest, I know now for my boat is
quickly drifting with the wind and I must offer
a gift of wine to Poseidon with a small prayer, right
Odysseus? I'm shirtless and sun-scorched but flash
flash, flash goes the water where
the dolphins swim next to my craft
and I see the too blue sea dancing all around.
I visit Pelops, Crete, Lesbos, and Cypress.
I see Greece and all of Italy in a day
in my head while I sit in Vancouver.
My imagination and memories of you keep me company
while I sit surrounded by family and half-strangers,
sipping mint juleps and crunching pretzels
in a lazy boy corner of a creaky, old wood floor.