Arundel - Papa M
Papa M
Live from a Shark Cage (1999)
I wake up in the dark, the attentiveness of the dog a thick vibration in the room. There are racoons in the courtyard plotting to upend a trash can. This is a house cut into quarters, divided by paper-thin walls and the laughing of neighbours. I am always anxiously conscientious, my life exposed in overheard coughs and whispers.
Sounds heard from other bedrooms: The tin-can warbling of pedlars selling hot yams from bicycle carts in Mexico City, accompanied by a melody of stray barks floating across rooftops. The alien electricity of cicadas in Melbourne and other gentle pricklings as insects wake up with the moon. Wolves in Yellowstone and wolves outside of Halifax, their wet beds cocooned in the grass the next morning. Once, a squalling shriek coming from wooded darkness, circling my small coastal cabin as if searching for a way in. Stones thrown against the window of an old apartment. Hunching down, hoping he can’t see my shadow in the moonlight.
I doze, spooning the warmth of the dog against my stomach. When I get up to pee, she curls up on my pillow and warms that too. Sun leaks across the bed while I am holding this image in my mind. The delicious not-quite-loneliness of your own set of rooms. Volume up, uninhibited. A wishing for no one to care. I kiss the dog between her half-closed eyelids.