Author Archives: michael way

Emily is my friend.

no.

now I don’t.

the between incident doesn’t keep going back and correcting stuff: your voice – because of the tender of my boys  – are you.

friends with any.

just sitting.

Technology  – just about your existence (call me baby, darling)

Johnny Cash, culminating in this together!

call Mike.

sound.

want a mini lesson? I invested and I want someone in the US and tested vested dementia.

no friends and all around. know you’ve split, but still  – what is Scott playing at?

“do the song.”

“I don’t know, do you believe in love my master of looks?  great for women…or aids.”

“old!”

be coming!

messed, it looks great for women…or aids for a woman.

BB, really baby, beep!

be baby, yeah baby baby

beep beep!

old dude, baby baby, BBB!

hi calista Flockhart.

doing baby baby

Lockhart crazy baby

and I really want to??

Question is: aren’t you crazy?

beanie baby baby

you owe me large breasted beanie baby baby,

sorry Kimberly and Brendan, Tran, and Heather!

my friend Emily is my friend, is my friend shutting,

she’s not just any large breasted Emily

is my friend.

Emily is my friend no now I don’t the between incident doesn’t keep going back and correcting stuff your voice because of the tender of my boys are you friends with any just sitting Technology just about your existence call me baby darling Johnny Cash the case together  ether I culminating in this together call Mike sound want a mini lesson I invested I want someone in the US and tested vested dementia no friends and all around know do you’ve splits but still what is Scott play a do the song I don’t know do you believe in love my master of looks great for women or aids  old be coming messed it looks great for women or aid for a woman BB really baby beep  be baby yeah baby baby beep beep old dude baby baby BBB hi calista Flockhart doing baby baby   Lockhart crazy baby and I really want to??  Question is aren’t you crazy beanie baby baby  you owe me large breasted beanie baby baby sorry Kimberly and Brendan Tran and Heather is my friend Emily is my friend is my friend shutting  she’s not just any remark on large breasted Emily is my friend Sean   time just favorite team

Ode to Vancouver

In the Battle for English I am a fucking Canon

Listen up kids, I’m only gonna say this once:

Your education is a battle and you’re on the front

I’m The General Impregnable to a boring read

And generally professional – I’ll take the lead.

I’m dangerous, I’m always taking risks,

and when I take my aim you know I never miss

if the institution’s got you down or worried

Remember it’s a Cuckoo’s Nest and I’m your McMurphy

I’m an English teacher and I’ll handle it

If my lessons were a dinner they’d be candlelit

A classroom well led with minds well fed,

And don’t forget that I’ve been chosen cuz I’m well B.Ed.

I’m busting mad rhymes and boosting my street cred

And every class of mine is a Special Ed

Yeah when I show my flow I’m gonna explode some heads

Because I’ve got more rhymes than Dempster’s got white bread.

Eyes up, ears open, tell me – what’s that sound?

There’s a new JD gun-Salinger in town.

Take the lessons that I’ve learned hard-earned in my own life

And apply it to the science of testing young minds,

They think I’m Grizzly Adams from my bearded looks

Until they find I got more rhymes than UBC’s got books

I’m the brains and the brawn when I educate

There’s a wrong way to teach and there’s a Mr. Way

And all of my students are going to shit a brick

When I pack my lessons full of rhymes fueled on ill, slick wit.

Refuse to be the teacher glued to the bored,

And when I approach the board their jaws will hit the floor,

Don’t think Mr. Way’s going to forget the Mike,

To pry his metaphors apart you need the jaws of life.

Consonance and assonance  reverberate

Constantly assuaging any fears that take ya

I’m the White Whale swimming in the English seas

And Queequeg’s coffin if you’re in too deep.

Eyes up, ears open, tell me – what’s that sound?

There’s a new JD gun-Salinger in town.

Way_Assignment_2

Poem Selections

The Plex song can be found here:

The much cooler Keny Arkana song can be found here:

Spruce Woods Provincial Park

If you wanted one less reason to visit Manitoba then make it Spruce Woods Provincial Park.

We arrive on a suffocating day in August and can’t find the Main Office.

When we do, it seems friendly Manitobans are, more accurately, indifferent Manitobans.

Lungs strain between low hanging dust from gravel trucks rocketing down the nearby highway and air like steam.

We seek refuge in the shade of the campground beneath twisted, stumpy trees where rectangular sand plots have been carved out of knotted, dark, thorny brush.

We’re told the provincial bird is the mosquito which seems to check out.

Crows laugh at us like malevolent, old drunk men.

We think that a swim in Kiche Manitou Lake will offer respite.

It offers stagnant, muddy water and more mosquitos.

We hope the widow makers hanging in every dying oak tree don’t impale us during our walk out of the park.

The park is adjacent to The Spirit Sands, where rogue sand dunes rise 30 metres into relentless prairie sky.

By “adjacent,” Manitoba Parks means “about a 2 K walk along a busy highway, over a dusty bridge crossing a wide, brown stretch of the Assiniboine River.”

First Nations in this area believed the sands were sacred.

It was a place of peace and diplomacy for feuding Nations to talk.

A sign barks at us to stay on the trails because there are live artillery shells from mid-twentieth century military drills lying undetonated throughout the area.

They should have fired them into the campground.

We never do find the gift shop but a T-shirt can never fully express despair anyway.

Step through the doors into musty air mixed with acrid, sweet colognes and nostril-singeing perfumes.

Don’t let Bob Gibson ogle your Mom or touch her long fingernails.  He’ll bike to your house while your Dad’s at work and scare her.  Have a laugh with your Mom and sister as you hide upstairs, terror turning to relief as you watch him swearing at your German Shepherd, Sheba, who won’t let him anywhere near the house before he bikes away in defeat.  Give Sheba some table scraps that night, and let her sleep inside for the first time.

Sit quietly during the sermon like all respectable five-year-olds.

Suspend your disbelief.

Listen to your father mumble lyrics in a deep, self-conscious monotone during the hymns, and wonder why he didn’t choose a religion that doesn’t demand group singing.  Also wonder why they would put high notes in almost every song.

Avoid questions or dialogue about mental health or identity issues when the minister is hospitalized for “exhaustion” and a member of the congregation shoots himself through the mouth during a lone, off-season, late night “hunting accident.”  After all, these issues have no place in the 1980s, or in a community setting aiming to inspire and uplift the human spirit.

Praise Him.

Suspend your disbelief.

Get kicked out of Sunday School at least every other week. Be proud that you are the reason your family sits in the back of the church so your grandmother doesn’t notice when you are sent back to sit through the sermon with your embarrassed parents.

Grow up into a hardened Athiest with basic critical thinking skills and a beautiful contempt for believing shit just because people tell you it’s true.

Drive by an empty relic of spirituality so forgotten and unnecessary that it pollutes the landscape with many others in small towns across the map. It’s ominous shell can’t contain your spirit, and you never needed it to be a decent person.

L’appel du vide

And amour fou

and you.

Wolves waiting at the door

and coyote at the piano score

L’appel du vide

Amour fou

and you, too.

Too dark in the moonlight.

Two wrongs make a right.

I wake with arms draped across my chest

your heart tied tight around my neck,

But it’s your smile I remember best,

Frost’s woods were lovely, dark, and deep,

and I’ve got you between my sheets

L’appel du vide

L’appel du vide

Amour fou

with you.