Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Richard Kilpatrick - World Traveller, Troubador, Student of Life.

From HSB, some of us went straight out to work, others to University /Cegep. Rick launched himself out into the world.

See also in the HSB Radio shots pictures of Mark Stafford and Brian McInnis.

Well Done Richard.
Everyone else please send more of these into me via e-mail if you prefer snail mail, let me know by e-mail and I'll send my coordinates.
Thanks. Les





















Hey buddy - yeah, I've been planning on scanning some old photos - just been caught up with the end of semester here. I tried posting the night Les first emailed us all but I must not have clicked the right buttons - Here's a few I've just scanned - the first one some of us at the school radio station; the second is one of me in Vancouver right after graduation, and the one below it on the same page is me a couple of years ago in Riga, Latvia; the last set of photos, starting at upper left, me '73 Morocco; below left in Nice, France and next to it, also in Nice with Mary Pinnseneault; and the photo on the right is me in Genova, Italy late '70s.

And, here's a couple of poems for the hell of it -
all good things -
Rick

Exposed

A tree quivers

in a melancholic field,

a land desiccated

where the screams

of cut forests are muffled

by duplicity.

I find beauty in this sorrow

and shudder

as separateness

confides in me

and together, we watch

night’s last violet shadow linger

towards dawn

on her red knees,

shame on her lips.

Rick Kilpatrick

Apparition of the Face of Aphrodite

“The wise man must be wise

before, not after” – Epicharmus

As I walk in the dirty rain

I see her, Bitch Goddess, a superlative

on high heels, full bodied

like a lager made from the sexiest

mountain springs, and I, drunk

that I am, dare to be foolish and come

undone like a Dali canvas dripping

off a Scorpion sky, ask if I could be her slave,

her knave, her male concubine (though not

faithfully in such terms)—yes, it was

coup de foudre (that sudden, overwhelming

numbness called love)—she, a masterpiece

of DNA, graces (I let myself suppose) in embryo. But I gather

myself, wipe them Gypsy Spanish blues

from my lack of face and disappear, hoping

I can disappear, when cherubic boy, perched,

appropriately, in his quiver tree, catches me (his 5-megapixal

Cyber-shot never lies), my harlequin escape hindered

as tuberose tangles slash at my legs

like jealous fingers. No—it’s Bitch Goddess, body

for dance, demolition, psychosis, dragging me, pushing me—

chasing me—to her world;

her glorious hell.

Rick Kilpatrick


Aqueous Humour

Their chatter seems nearer, appears

part of the blue breeze that carries it

from their projected jaws

as they bobble their heads, backs

to the waves, propped up

by tails unceasingly working the water

below. The morning air clears

her throat as though ready to testify

to the holiness of it all; my head fills

with bird’s flight, the labor of words

inwardly misplaced, but not lost. A tacit

amity has risen like tides of the full moon

clinging to a duotone of daylight and dark as two

humpback dolphins giggle and splash at me,

angling for a tête-à-tête. I splash back

and reach out my hand and nod

like them and they dance and spin as if to thank me

for the pleasure. Between synchrony

and diachrony we follow the trace of time until the sands

collapse among Lamu’s mangroves;

African sublime speaks tongues that flame irony on my path.

What does it mean to touch nature

when it touches you? I saw Oceanids on a morning

walk, or they appeared in a dream. What would it mean to you?

Rick Kilpatrick

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