My sweater-vests and cardigans,
my necessary junk,
my shower-curtain rings of course:
my life is in my trunk.

A framed glossy picture
of Marie, my better half,
but not her perfume (jasmine),
her cooking, or her laugh.

From New York to Chicago
and Chicago to New York,
the days are seldom sunny,
the nights are always dark.

Pretty soon I’ll have to pack it in,
I’m getting old.
There’s not a lot worth having
that a travel trunk can hold.

*****

Editor’s comments: From Pino Coluccio you should expect light and dark combined, light but deep, usually short, always well-phrased… and always existential. This poem is from Class Clown, which won a Trillium Award, putting Coluccio in the company of fellow Ontarians Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje and Alice Munro.

Pino Coluccio lives in Toronto.

Photo: “Travelling Trunk” by Bart Heird is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.