J. Marshall Freeman is a writer of fiction and poetry. His queer-hero YA novels include THE DUBIOUS GIFT OF DRAGON BLOOD and BARNABAS BOPWRIGHT SAVES THE CITY. Freeman has released two chapbooks of his poetry and co-hosts the monthly Poetry Open Mic at Buddies in Bad times Theatre.

Flowering Trees and Towers of Gold

Mostly the Magnolias

This video came together organically. I was riding my bike through residential neighbourhoods after visiting my elderly father. It was that most beautiful time of spring when I swoon over trees in blossom, especially my favourite, the magnolia, which gives us just a few spectacular days of pink glory every year. I stopped and took video footage every time I saw a blossoming tree, and when I got home and reviewed the footage, the video took shape in my head. I knew I wanted a poem to go with it, and the verse quickly fell into place. I think that because the words were in service to the video footage rather than being my primary focus, it took the pressure off of the writing. I ended up creating what I now find to be a surprising and evocative poem much more quickly than usual and without as much second-guessing. Finally, in searching for the right music, I remembered a beautiful piece by my friend, the composer John Gray, and asked his permission to include it.

Atonement

This poem, written with repeating structural elements in an A-B-A-B-C-A structure, is about our individual and collective relationships with capitalism. The ‘A’ sections are based on the Al Chet, the Prayer of Atonement, recited on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar. In that prayer, we list sins by category and ask for forgiveness. The poem’s ‘B’ sections, misleadingly called “action items,” list a series of preposterous products and stances, presented as surreal plays on words. The middle section, ‘C,’ presents the world in the form of a fantasy tale, a great castle where the wonders of the world are stripped for parts to grow a mountain of coin. I created the video, with author Matt W. Cook as my videographer and co-director, close to Yom Kippur last fall. The overlay footage in the C section is the tower of the Canada Life Building.