ditch,

Marianne Perron is a graduate of the Concordia English Literature and Creative Writing program. She has published a collection of poetry with Montreal’s With Words Press. Her work has appeared numerous times in Soliloquies Anthology, and she has several poems slated to appear in upcoming issues of PRECIPICe, Crannog, and Headlight.
 
Marianne is the Editor-in-Chief of the Grasshopper Reads online book review, dedicated to contemporary Canadian literature. She has been known to review films, bars, and poetry, and has a column for the film website Sound on Sight in the works. Her screenplay, La Bonne Soeur, was a finalist in SODEC’s Cours Ecrit Ton Court, and her latest collaboration, Footsies, is scheduled for production in 2010.

Harlot

Julie Ruin died a long time ago.
Secretarial assets silenced
by a friendly revolution.

Hands off.
Kill the lights, jump in, let go.

Dynamite in the lungs.

Love: Melissa, Justine, and Clea.

Discussing the world
in obituary terms

they fall out of dissension
and back in line again.












Upon Seeing Your New Lover at the Symphony Orchestre

Let’s do away with the you

                                    and I.

Intimacy escapes
                        leaving a vapor

            where once trod a horse whip
            fast and hard.

            Flesh, burned raw.
            Smoked

                        to tender perfection.
                        Let’s carve
                        a little closer
                        to the hip.

Who wants cymbals
and mandolins

the earth’s cropped
right down to the bone
and brittle mistress
always has a simple    

                                    face. 












                        Squirrel with Birthday Candle


                                                                                    number seven

                                                                                                gleamed

                                                            in  his mouth
                                                                                                dripping
                                                            icing cake yellow
                                                                                       swirl

                                                                        of plum delight


                                     on the third step his tethered legs clamp

                                                               like a set of squeamish jaws, gnawing

                                                   on a limb extended
                                                                                    in birthday greet –



                                                au revoir to sixth year blues –

                                                                        in fuzzy pink, pearly mouth
                                                          tantrum of wishes

                                                                                    don’t let
                       
                                                                        a good fish

                                                                                                escape












                                                            buzz buzz


                                                                          in my ear, when my neck grows
                                                                                                                         cold.
                                                                                               
                                                                                                                       I shudder
                                                                        strings of pearls clench
                                                                                                      my skin
                                                                                                                   drag
                                                                           the goose bites
                                                                                    masquerade the sound                                                                                                                                                     of key.

                                                                        I want all your secrets
                                                                                  in a comb of golden syrup
                                                                                                         I can crystallize,
                                                                         
                                                                        weave through my hair
                                                                                                  until it pinches
                                                                                                                        on the lip of
                                                                                                             secrets
                                                                                                                    that involve me.












                                                                        On Color Schemes

                                                                                oh red,
                                                                                             rot
                                   
                                                                                    leaves around your mouth because

                                                                                                it is October

                                                                                                            things become

                                                                                                      these images

                                                                                         of fire

                                                                           it is not Osiris, in a tomb of colored floor

                                                                                        it is a splatter of these hands
           
                                                                            that are so yellow, wet and tired

                                                                                    like a million tongues

                                                                        in revolution contre the martyr -

                                                                                                you I watch
                       
                                                                                                                        with interest