Toronto 1

I tramped my early time 

In Kingsway roads so said by English

Names of kings and queens and princes.

Grown among the Humber flow,

Ravine side scrambler,

Adventurer,

Salamander hunter,

Clamberer of my dangerous heights,

Now but a shoulder lifted tug,

A distance to hoist and hug.

I tramped along the unlocked time

To pass the open doors and linger

For the bread man’s basket at the back,

For the laundry strung by patterns placed,

For the milk man’s bottles, thick cream on top,

For the front flung open, the delivery calls.

The world came in – my world went out.

Now doors there are to touch, mankind’s

But just by keys, to close behind.

I tramped with the horse clomp’s end

Of wagons pulled, by finished war delayed.

The sound made soon to power’s noise,

Packed and wrapped by glory chrome

That bragged by curves and glint

And gathered neighbors homage round

To greet the new, and speak

Expert each of specs and speed and style.

Now good sense is seen as best

With some regretted loss of innocence.

I tramped among the unknown voices

Of other places poured upon our grid

Of tastes and smells combined

Of soundings sensed in tabled tours

Of changes charged to leave behind

My own English Irish city’s start to be

This now boundless blend of peoples’ parts

Played first in streets of new arrival

Drifting daily in our current’s tide

That casts us all a chorus on Ontario’s side.

Now the other places are surprise,

Where no faces but like my own arise.

I am a tramp

Wearing ragged jagged time

To rummage places where past is present

Knowing for well and worst

The changes that my forbears feared

Have wrought alive at least my love

Of all the difference that makes us same

In this city huged in my drifting days

Coloured, touched and made

From universal unbounded rays

In fond and unexpected ways.