I drove five hours through the spine of Ontario,
two lanes humming like an old Hip song,
the sky pressing low, waiting to exhale,
Bobcaygeon awaits like some half-remembered dream,
a town know for a melody, lit by a myth.
I stood by the water where Gord must have stood,
where the past drapes itself over rooftops and docks,
and I waited for the stars to reveal themselves,
not hypothetical, not dull, not lost to the city’s haze,
but sharp as a whispered truth, rising one by one.
Then the sky broke open, no subtle unveiling,
but a firestorm of light, a cathedral of color,
the Northern Lights dancing like Downie, a Kingston jig,
bathing me the coke machine like glow,
giving me a show only I could understand.
Five hours back ahead, a road tight with stretched silence,
headlights will carve through the weight of thought of the future,
of voices rising, carrying that Aryan twang,
the future a thing with jagged edges, waiting to cut,
but not tonight, not while I have this.
I have the Northern Lights, I have that peace,
Bobcaygeon, pressed against my ribs like a hymn,
like a promise they can’t touch, they can’t take,
the sky will always split open for me here,
one star at a time.