leonardcohenforum.com

Are girlfriends better,

Are girlfriends better,
Or worse, in the matter
Of handling the wife?
Sitting here outside Afghanistan
Local ethnic music
Playing high in the
Ceiling above this pour
Of red wine from the
Sikh family winery in the
Okanagan valley of
British Columbia
I Admit
I have no more interest
In India than do you.
Which brings me back to girlfriends
Present and absent
Including, if we must, my wife.
Who presses the grapes
Anyway rules the roost
Or keeps gonads in check?
This dislocation - such as
Leonard Cohen singing
In his seventies - is like lusting
After a fantasy that is
Older than your teeth
Wondering whether
Life is worth $4.95
To add shrimp
To vegetable biryani
Except that my wife
Lives half her year
In Istanbul where her boyfriends
Have sisters who have sisters
Who are dress designers.
(By the way this second bottle
Of wine is unusually as good
As the first and the platters
Are on their way to being
Breakfast. ) Girlfriends are
Useful in this regard sometimes
Even interrupting
The wife's soliloquy
To discuss the need
To create a clear contract
Rather than a conversation
About how little there is
In the pot. All I remember
Is the falling
Falling down the stairs
But always towards the light
Always towards the light
My neck already broken
And thereby saved by its brace.

Have I left anything out?


Vancouver
Maurya Restaurant
17th April 2009

Have I left anything out?

Yes, the onion bhaji.
if you only have an extra $5, I would choose that over the shrimp.
----

I'm not sure that I like this, but I've come back a few time to read so I do think it's interesting.

I see it as a man sitting at a table of an Indian restaurant writing a poem to himself and interrupting his thoughts at times to worry about his food. It seems that his marriage might just be a formality, that the two prefer their separate lives but the reality of duty and finances require a certain amount of working together. If I understand correctly N is wondering whose approach with the wife would be better, his to explain the situation she might understand, or his girlfriend's a clear and more formal agreement (money seems to be the issue - even at dinner) . I can't say that I like N, he seems cold to both girlfriend(s) and wife. The setting is interesting as is the brace.

Welcome to the forum (if you're new),

Cate

Hi Utu,

I liked your (slightly inebriated) poem, even more so on discovering that it was written at Maurya Restaurant in Vancouve, where the food is excellent.

It was fun to find a recognizable element in your poem. We are city-mates (I presume you live in Vancouver...). Are you going to see Leonard at GM place tomorrow?

I was in a restaurant on Friday evening with my wife and a girlfriend, which is where I wrote the poem, and we did have two bottles of wine, and all those issues came up in some form, and yes there are issues, and yes we have known each other for over twenty years, and yes there are other histories the poem hints at but are not fleshed out (eg the brace), and yes I am going - with my wife and another girlfriend - to the Leonard Cohen concert in Vancouver on Sunday night, and yes this is the first time I have shared a poem on any site like this, and yes I like the vulnerability of it all, and no there is no coldness at all - but then again that is the crux of the issue(s).

ahhh you where all together, in my minds eye I had pictured N being alone - perhaps trying to sort through things.

and no there is no coldness at all - but then again that is the crux of the issue(s).

yes, I see your point.
I didn't mean to imply that you are cold, just that the character I was reading in a poem seemed cold - I'm not sure why I envisioned N being by himself. Maybe because I was sitting alone when I read it.

Hey Utu,

If you want to say hello tonight (fine if you don't, lots of people prefer to remain anonymous) I'll be at the pre-show at GM place from around 5:30, with a ballon marked:

WWW
leonardchoenforum
.com

...and we are going for drinks after to Lucy Mae Brown, on Richards Street (the only place open until 1:00 am on Sunday)