Steve McOrmond

Happy Hour

You’ve fallen in love with an old
friend’s wife. You keep meeting her
in dreams, she wafts a dusky scent
across the table, sets you adrift in her eyes.
You can talk about nothing for hours.
A second-story man, you’re used to taking
whatever catches your fancy. Always
the quiet one in school, dear old aunties
pegged you for a priest, but you knew
your studied unobtrusiveness would pay off
bigger. On hands and knees, you’re a shoo-in
for front hall tables at midnight. Homeowners
throw coats on top of you, proceed to the bedroom.
You wear the lady’s sable and slip out
French doors. Or so you tell me over doubles,
neat. I have that kind of face: strangers
approach and uncork themselves.

Steve McOrmond

Steve McOrmond’s first book of poetry, Lean Days, was published in Spring 2004 by Wolsak and Wynn (Toronto). His poems have appeared widely in literary magazines across Canada including Event, The Malahat Review and PRISM International, as well as on nthposition.com (UK). His work is anthologized in Breathing Fire 2: Canada’s New Poets (Nightwood 2004). A second poetry collection entitled ‘Primer on the Hereafter’ is forthcoming in 2006. He lives in Toronto.