Grandpa records everything. His Plautdietsch

accent at breakfast orders you

to turn around, wave spoon at camera.

‍

Back home, your parents perform

renovations: Mom slugging holes in drywall

for Pops to patch. After the car crash

‍

Grandma plays tapes on loop

for a year. A rotten box of them

shows up blank but with sound.

‍

You name each noise: Jackie chopping

watermelon, Deb slurping from the hose,

that neighbour’s fat Chihuahua

‍

in the kiddie pool. It gets so you know

which season by a wavelength

of breath. Grandma laughs at herself

‍

in the living room, drapes drawn, watching

a black box. But when he huffs, mumbles

through the speaker, you don’t blink.

‍

•

‍

Your bunkie has AIDS and loves a scrap. He chokes

below, coughs, lungs like a damp paper bag. The ones

he clocks just bolt. Christened Torpedo, in the caf

‍

real quiet behind Hitler who cussed him out

for using the clippers, your bunkie winked then snapped

a hook into The Führer’s ear. He stomped the steel

‍

gangway outside Sharky’s cell, red fists raised,

shouted I’m the king of the world before the COs

unloaded two cans of mace on him, flopped face down.

‍

The grate engraved his gagging mouth. Milky hush

of spray stained his head. Sharky got him back,

cracked the tin edge of a food tray across

‍

his scabbed dome, stamped him into the pay phone. Listen

to each sigh and night-toss. His skin peels the gym mat. Hear

him masturbate pre-dawn, the dry tug, reckless hoorah. Often

‍

you hear him hearing you hearing him, hear him thinking

you never sleep, thinking you think too much. Your ears raw

from damp tissues molded in. His huffs echo through the cell.

‍

•

‍

Sleeping in a clapboard boathouse

on Matsqui Slough, one year out,

where wind whines through boards

‍

worn concrete-smooth, the tin roof

rattles, sudsy floodtides pat divots

in the grey clay and muck and gulls

‍

squawk from the dock all night, you,

awake at four AM, grind each huff

through your head, cough, mumble

‍

in bed and scare yourself.