“Water restrictions” by Veronika Gorlova
Poetry Pause is the League of Canadian Poets’ daily poetry dispatch. Read “Water restrictions” by Veronika Gorlova.
Water restrictions
By Veronika Gorlova
Nothing poetic has happened to me lately. I’ve been stealing
anecdotes from other people, to slip into my poems. Listening
to my boyfriend’s stories with the ear of a pickpocket.
He called it the summer of lost animals. The time he found
a family’s runaway dogs because he had nothing better to do.
The time he came across a wounded cockatoo, put it in a box
and went door-to-door in Kerrisdale asking if the bird belonged
to someone. I can’t think of anything like that to tell you. I’m just lying
on Wreck Beach watching planes fly overhead, happy to be on the ground,
smelling salt water in the breeze. The summer has been hot
and dry. We’re being warned of incoming water restrictions.
The earth and I are thirsty, waiting on revelations from the sky.
I was cautioned about dating another poet, but
I was never told why. Maybe we don’t like ending
up on each other’s pages: snapshots we wouldn’t have captured
ourselves, a painting slightly askew. Like a shadow
following us down the beach–tethered and alien all at once.
Copyright © Veronika Gorlova
Veronika Gorlova is a queer, autistic, Jewish poet and writer living on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations, also known as Vancouver. Her family immigrated to Canada from Ukraine when she was five years old and she has lived in many parts of the country. Second runner up for the 2024 Magpie Award for Poetry, her writing appears or is forthcoming in ARC Poetry Magazine, Pulp Literature and Emerge 22.
Subscribe to Poetry Pause, or support Poetry Pause with a donation today!