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    What Kind of Man Are You
    What Kind of Man Are You
    What Kind of Man Are You
    Ebook104 pages33 minutes

    What Kind of Man Are You

    By Degan Davis

    ()

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    About this ebook

    What does it mean to be a man now? These poems’ answers are bold and deeply moving.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrick Books
    Release dateApr 1, 2018
    ISBN9781771314749
    What Kind of Man Are You
    Author

    Degan Davis

    Degan Davis spent his childhood in Mattawa, Ontario, at the confluence of two rivers. He works as a Gestalt Therapist, both in a university setting and in private practice. Degan's poetry and non-fiction have appeared in such places as The Globe and Mail, The Malahat Review, Riddle Fence, and The New Quarterly. He is currently working on a collection of essays about masculinity, femininity, and how to be a good man in this era. He lived for many years in St. John’s and now lives in Toronto.

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      Book preview

      What Kind of Man Are You - Degan Davis

      SPEAK

      Tribe

      Behind the five-and-dime Peter, then I,

      slice veins with a Coke-bottle shard,

      hold up our arms: a salute

      to forever, to federation,

      to love. Pulses cross-babbling

      heartward. Our first move

      streetwise. Dark red streaming

      onto my blue rubbers.

      We are nine. Blood brothers.

      We say it out loud, itchy, edging closer.

      I watch myself, giddy,

      terrified, releasing

      the last breath of being

      self-contained

      in my own frantic circuit—

      trust rehoused,

      two tribes bled

      into one.

      Pugilists on Toronto Island

      Two men wade in drunk,

      trip over waves,

      wrestle and go under

      for long gulps of time.

      Those of us on the sand

      keep an eye on them (meaning

      we pretend to ignore them; meaning human

      embarrassment).

      They are in their forties or fifties

      or sixties: drink or poverty or chronic

      you-name-it

      has worn them ageless. They shout,

      careen, lunge, and pull each other

      down, wiry bodies dripping

      with lake water.

      In my loneliest hours

      I too have a need to be consumed

      by another, to be held so tightly

      I might not notice the drowning.

      Sometimes destitution gives you the keys

      to the outside and you enter it

      like your own living room while

      the rest of the world flickers.

      When a good punch straight to the head

      knocks one into the cold, grey

      water I sit up, ready to go in,

      not knowing what the hell I’ll do if . . .

      and as he staggers back up, they hug

      like weary boxers, laughing, retreating, jabbing,

      two actors in a Beckett play

      whose director has gone AWOL and whose stagehands

      have left up a set piece for a raging

      loneliness—

      the beautiful orange horizon and pale shining lake,

      the truckloads of hot white sand.

      Monkeys

      A sour reek of jockstraps rises

      around the Double A team at airport security,

      and I smile at the young men’s

      camaraderie, their easy

      muted laughter, which stand them

      apart as a small country that believes in itself.

      One guy grabs another’s cap—

      My bloody lucky toque!—clean off

      his shaved head and wigs it

      up and away into the cavernous

      airport firmament to tribal cheers, and I think of

      World War One and how bored the men were

      and how one wrote in a letter,

      I’m looking for anything to happen. And how sometimes

      I’m looking for anything to happen—yearning

      to risk my life

      (or just take a puck) for

      no other reason than perhaps Brotherhood.

      As they yip and pitch the cap back and forth

      I recall seeing P. K. Subban lead

      the pre-game practice of the Montreal Canadiens

      in Buffalo, cannoning the puck at near-

      impossible angles into the net, an ecstatic

      geometry—when all at once

      a frequent flier in a tall suit,

      sleek trench coat draped over his arm,

      leans in, comradely, motions

      to

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