Whirlpool, poetry

Previously published as The Lead Guitarist, poetry: First Edition: Serialized in spark* (Vancouver, BC), 2000. Excerpt published in CHALLENGER international (Quesnel, BC), 2008. Second Edition: Published in An Introductory Creative Writing Program-Monograph Two (Academic Exchange Extra, 2009, January [University of Northern Colorado: Greeley, CO]). Third Edition: LukivPress (Quesnel, BC), 2014. Fourth Edition: Published in Creative Writing for Senior Secondary Students (LukivPress [Quesnel, BC], 2014). New title, Whirlpool, poetry: Revised Edition: LukivPress (Sardis, BC), 2022. An excerpt The Lead Guitarist From a winter-scarred porch,

I peer at the skyline-

I'm a radar

Scanning for altitude

(Not that you should steer

By radar: that's like inviting rocks

Into your hull). I see lines of Trans Atlantic

Clouds

As grey as poor rhythm

And as long as Beethoven's ninth.

But I imagine them as

Simply grey beasts,

Or ship-punching fists,

Or strings of blue hearts lost

In Les Paul-pickups-

Pickups that change finger-licking

Scribbles

Into electric licks

And screams. I scan the blue sky above

The grey lines;

I'm a Malibu surfer

Sighting a dream-wave,

A Cariboo logger

Attacking lunch, And a sunbather

With red shades. Before my day ends,

I'll turn the colour blue

Into an overdrive-

Feast, In spite of the ache-

In spite of /Me. The author Dan Lukiv, published in 19 countries, is a poet, novelist, columnist, short story and article writer, and independent education researcher (hermeneutic phenomenology). As a creative writer, he apprenticed with Canada's Professor Robert Harlow (recipient of the George Woodcock Achievement award for an outstanding literary career), the USA's Paul Bagdon (Spur Award finalist for Best Original Paperback), and England's D. M. Thomas (recipient of the Cheltenham Prize for Literature, Orwell Prize [biography], Los Angeles Fiction Prize, and Cholmondeley award for poetry). He attended The University of British Columbia (creative writing department), the acclaimed Humber School for Writers (poetry writing program), and Writer's Digest University (novel writing program).