

"Mobile garden dress" by Nicole Dextras, as seen in installation at Todmorden Mills, Toronto, July 2014.
What I want
What i want to know is, yellow lady, light midsummer light
yes you, yellow-skirt
dandelion, lionness
potted pothead
on Pottery Road
potting pots
potting about lady
skirting there
yes, you
mellow yellow-dappled hoop
under pleated wear
bodice bodied
basket-boned, pot-bellied pot
how many children under there
madame, my dame?
i want to know how many children
under skirts
under wear
wasp-waisted yet
earthen-ware mother
potted mum
yellow mums
mum's nasturtiums, you say?
i jus'
want to know wish to know
bee-crowned
begowned
(earth-skirt)
ravish
you
Dawn Promislow is the author of Jewels and Other Stories (Mawenzi House, 2010), which was long-listed for the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award 2011, and named one of the 8 best fiction debuts of 2011 by The Globe and Mail. She has a novel forthcoming in 2022. She lives in Toronto.
Like this:
Like Loading...
Related
Published by darcie friesen hossack
Darcie Friesen Hossack is a graduate of the Humber School for Writers. Her short story collection, Mennonites Don’t Dance, was a runner-up for the Danuta Gleed Award, shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers Prize and the Ontario Library Association's Forest of Reading Evergreen Award for Adult Fiction. Citing irreverence, the book was banned by the LaCrete Public Library in Northern Alberta.
Having mentored with Giller finalists Sandra Birdsell (The Russlander) and Gail Anderson Dargatz (Spawning Grounds, The Cure for Death by Lightening), Darcie is now completing her first novel where, for a family with a Seventh-day Adventist father and a Mennonite mother, the End Times are just around the corner.
Darcie is also a four time judge of the Whistler Independent Book Awards, and a career food writer. She lives in Northern Alberta, Canada, with her husband, international award-winning chef, Dean Hossack.
View more posts