Orion headless

by Tyler Bigney

Let’s fold a map and throw darts.
We’ll give the beds, the books and the cream coloured sofa
to charity and leave this town, leave the apartment
with the leaking roof and splintering floorboards that
rip holes in our socks.
We’ll move to the country. I’ll fish in the spring,
hunt deer in autumn and trap rabbits in the winter.
I could pay off my debts and you could bake blueberry pie.
The air feels better in the country. All those trees!
Think of the reds and yellows of autumn and
the pictures you could paint on our screened in porch.
We could spread out a blanket in the backyard
and wait for the stars, see if we burn brighter than them.
They’re all dead, but we’re not dead. Not yet.
I was thinking you could wear your thin,
flowery skirt and I’ll wear my khaki shorts.
We could pretend that we’re in love again, and
make love like the Russians
holed up in their apartments in the dead of winter.
We’ll wake up early – nine o’clock -
and sit outside on lawn chairs.
Promise that you’ll save me,
and I’ll do the same. I need your hope. And don’t tell me
it’s false hope, because I once heard someone say,
there is never anything false about hope, and I believed them.
We’ll go to church. I’ll believe in God like I did when
I was five, when I was naïve and in love with everything –
dirt, ants, trees, and the sky that shaped a map.
We’ll take Sunday drives and eat donuts,
the windows down, the radio on.
We’ll drive to New Brunswick and get lost in the ebbing tides
of the Bay of Fundy. We’ll cross the bridge to Prince Edward Island,
ride the rollercoaster until we throw up.
Or we could go to Quebec,
speak from a French-English dictionary,
and laugh with our mouths open.
Have you ever dreamt of being someone else?

I used to dream I was rich, but I grew bored and missed
the chase of money.
Of being two weeks overdue on rent, and not knowing
where the next hundred dollars was coming from.
Of selling a poem for three dollars and banking
on the money for a loaf of bread from Wal-Mart.
Of buying lottery tickets and imagining a nice apartment
in Iceland, Turkey, or Moscow. Of first class seats
on a one way flight travelling somewhere warm. Somewhere
most people can’t to afford. Like Fiji or Dubai.
Of you not having to strip for men,
whose fingers lurk close to your sweet spot
when slipping you a five. Of you not crying
on the bathroom floor after I’ve fallen asleep.
Of not carrying you into the hospital,
and explaining to the nurses and doctors
that I found you next to an empty bottle of pills.

Come on baby, let’s do it. I’ll start the car, you pack a picnic lunch.
We need the country, full of stars, and mosquitoes
the size of maple leaves. Those tiny streams and rivers
that all lead to the Atlantic Ocean, eventually.
We need to believe that love is real, and that
it is something to be desired.
I am trying to lead you home.