IN MEMORY OF JON PENNERStrange death even the half-tamed winds off Lake Ontario moan through Toronto ... Leaves in High Park are telling stories how trapped hours in your rusting car the police took you to jail instead of hospital. They say you hanged yourself in the night! You who were a semi-pro fighter not fighting for glory but for the peace of a needle in your arm. This fighter hanged himself? Cat burglar who clung to life on frozen sills! You defeated the needle and forsook the city's catspaw money to live miles down a deserted road - alone - in a house so haunted the moon glowed through cracks at midday. Strange they feared your politics of democracy while you lived alone writing novels and making magic with your silver chloride half-tones. The wind you now haunt tells strong tales ... the leaves are redder this fall. Your murderers twist and turn and don't know why the full moon on the Ottawa Valley glows brighter than the sun. - Chris Faiers (April 2006) |