Poetry

Windows


There are men in my house today
They unload glass panes and aluminum
frames, ladders, saws, crowbars and
lime-coloured insulation, some
noxious spray that makes new windows

glide
with ease
The men, though,
they do not glide
but stomp and push

force and grunt
old windows
out
push new ones
in

surround them with pristine
frames,
white and glistening
Someone recently told me
women use 10,000 words a day
Men use only half

These men use
no words
take their noise,
and leave
a sparkling clarity of view
echo of the unsaid

Carolyne Van Der Meer is a Montreal journalist and editor who is completing her Ph.D. dissertation in Canadian literature at Université de Montréal. Her poetry has been published in Helios and Bibliosofia (Italy) and is forthcoming in Canadian Woman Studies/les cahiers de la femme.