Toronto

I found myself running full speed

even when I was sitting

and then I’d stand and go somewhere else

but even all that standing and going was a full-out sprint

and I began to speak with the same quick movements

and sleep, think, eat, love, pray, hate,

be with the same never-stopping, ever-fleeing pace

of a gazelle bounding through the savannah

but this was Toronto and there were no gazelles here

though who am I kidding the city was full of them

displaced, fighting to survive on concrete, lighting up

on Bay street, drinking from gutters because

deep down I knew they were once watering holes 

and that something beautiful must be in that place

but I couldn’t stop the running to find it

until finally the night came that I found myself kneeling in the sand looking up into the starry sky that reflected perfectly in the water so I couldn’t see where the heavens stopped and the earth began and

I lay down between my mother and father

and took a deep breath

like a slow trickling stream, not a running one.

In the morning I awoke. I saw the trails and streams I made

With my feet and tears and I couldn’t help but feel

Amazed.