John is a social worker working in the field of disability management and holds degrees in social work, rehabilitation services, and psychology. He is the author of seven books of poetry: “March” (2019), “The Seasons of Us” (2019), New Days (2020), Fragments (2021), A Long Walk (2023), A Curious Art (2023) and Sojourns (2024). His work has appeared widely in numerous literary journals, magazines, and anthologies internationally. John is also a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee and lives in Caledon Ontario, Canada with his wife and two children.
The Thaw
The thaw comes slow
Like some old god
Waking from a dream
As ice withdraws
From stone and soil
Revealing
A tender green
Long buried
And sleeping
With the wind still sharp
But carrying something new
Something warm
And the black birds
Turn their heads to listen
Defiance
Moments
Weary from the weight
Of suffering
Fumbling
At the edge of despair
Pondering peace
As mocking illusion
But stumbling forward
Through pure resilience
And perseverance
All the same
Refusing to be extinguished
Where to endure is to defy
And in defiance
Salvation
Farmhouse in Tuscany
High on a hill
In the Tuscan light
Weathered stone
And sunburnt clay
Its ochred bones
Tangled in green arteries
Olive trees
Holding secrets
From the wind
And the cypress sentinels
Tall and lean
And mournful
Stabbing at the sky’s
Soft belly
The walls
Thick with the breath
Of centuries
The hearth a red-mouthed ghost
Swallowing the evening’s silence
And beyond the fields
The sun sinks slow
And swollen
Bleeding its last gold
Into the furrows
As night creeps in
Black as dreaming
impspired 