Birthday
Against October air,
against placental heat and ruptured sac
my birth exuded, I intruded.
Cried out, beyond
electrified wire, dissuaded cattle,
half-buried barley, slurred canola, fescue bedded thick with rain.
Synchronized to the uses
of our household, our persons,
shiver
of a tall vase, or tupperware that floats across a room,
quieted. Stared at snail-like growth on sills.
Uneffaced,
supplied verses.
Grew ill with patience,
tadpole intensities, pursued by mosquitoes,
unpopular in brooding frogskin.
Maturated, for seven years, yoked to professorial altars.
Indexed self-regard to the inflationary nudge
to adjudicate this or that.
Biffed it.
Boarded, in distress, a trans-Atlantic flight,
bleated from a phrasebook, that or this,
that or this. Overpacked a spliff.
Under exploded jacarandas, as if,
on a stretcher, carried,
too brief among the feral dogs, a loaned out
colour on this face, slept.
Or hopped, a bit drunk,
wrought iron, ice cream on my teeth.
Been and done upfront
or indirect,
continuous things, unfurled,
evenly flamboyant. Lopsidedly
dried out: adrift for salt
or glisten,
adequate, roaring small —
have I a voice like mine — have I held back? Upset
absences. Unserious, climbed urine-scented
steps to walk exposed
rebar, see the dark disclose. Sparred
with obligation,
without harness, above willows
suspended in my grief,
indebted, begged insight,
burnt myself
in toothsome blue, destitute for a pit, for a grave,
jacketless, went to lengths I could not talk,
blew, for what it’s worth,
three hundred on perfume, one on a meal,
studied near
extinct techniques, wore mask
for sport in lingerie, ate bad trout, had a toenail torn out,
lit cigarettes
with metered, hay-gold dancers,
unstoppered pulls of wine
all night in pizza parlours,
doing no harm — unbarred
by teriyaki talk, our
enthralled
genitalia. Turned my head
to a device,
melodious, unvivid,
stippled, every thought,
walked in disconnect or slippage,
frantic, in underwear
in December,
out her locked car, deathless, flushed.
Met my wife.
Did not
rush til feeling came like mist. Stuttering
inner blasts, I
suffused. Mixed up, unacquainted, with courage.
Late enough, made out
at my worst,
furious, bumped-into —
my mother fumbling around
ghost-like, spilling liquor –
did not drink a year but palped a jot that burns
dollar-sized inside-out —
of those
headless swirling, up and gone, I love.
True, after a plate of sunny
shrimp, exited
la Peña la Platería in a pinch. Contracted,
in a meat sweat on a toilet,
cramp and flux
of thirty anuses. Got wise. Spots to slip on, hanging.
All-in,
loping, pelted. Every
moment
hunted, jacked up — laid bare.
On stage, recited lines, searched for tape that marked my place,
loved, in languor, sang among
vapours,
took, slant.
Now? Midlife, I have,
for eighteen months, done nothing
my son won’t,
notorious, evergreen,
for tinsel or balloon. Coo in ditty-doggerel. Gesticulate for milk
or snug, or eat a bloom.
Root canal, wart or fluff,
a bit of passion, or a struggle
for a breath. Listen,
if meaning,
pain, coextend — razor-flash in rain — it’s now,
but now,
but now.
GARTH MARTENS is a poet and flamenco artist. His first book Prologue for the Age of Consequence (Anansi, 2014) was a finalist for Canada’s Governor General’s Award for Poetry. Martens is also a past winner of the Bronwen Wallace Award for Emerging Writers. His latest poetry collection is Who Else in the Dark Headed There (Biblioasis, 2026). His work appears in Dark Mountain Project, Poetry Ireland, Hazlitt, Fiddlehead, Witches Magazine (UK), and Best Canadian Poetry. He is also a co-founder, producer, and performer for Palabra Flamenco, a literary flamenco ensemble that joins traditional flamenco dance and music with poetry and oral storytelling. Find him on Instagram @garthmartens