Close to the library there are many murals. You note several bags of garbage below the beautiful lettering on the wall. There are a lot of homeless people around the library. I cannot imagine why. Certainly I never see them hanging about in the library. George Orwell mentions the library as a favorite haunt in his “Down and out..” book. Not in Montreal. The library is across the street from the long distance bus station. What is it about bus and train stations that attract the homeless? They seldom have the money to go anywhere. Are travellers a soft touch for pan-handlers? I doubt it. When I travel I am often paranoid about losing my stuff or being robbed or conned. These fears have little basis, judging from my little experience. I don’t like to write that the homeles people and the garbage bags in the shadow of the museum have a disturbing connection. I have to write it though. The library is a sacred spot where homeless are somehow not welcome.

I had a garbage moment myself today. I got a rejection letter from a well established Canadian publisher. You know they’re well established when the ask you to send hard copy instead of electronic and you must put in a stamped self addressed envelope if you want feedback. My feedback was in part ” the acquisitions editor commented that this is an attractive selection of your poems, but he did not find the sort of heft necessary to attract potential readers.” I ask you readers, do you like hefty poems? It is a mysterious comment and one that will not, I fear, inspire the slightest change in my writing practice. It was a garbage moment but as I have done more times than I like to admit, I will get out of the garbage heap. My poetry is homeless but not hopeless. Self publishing starts to look better and better.