Poem: The Thousand Deaths of Canton

Canton died on Monday

And then again on Friday

And in between

A thousand other deaths

All in a row—

His breathing shallow,

His passion stretched wide

Like a well dug for water supply

Now a brimming

Hole.


Canton’s misery has a name—

A she as you may have guessed

With brownish hair and

Bluish eyes

Anchored to her soul,

Her voice sounds

Like frogs chanting

In the night,

A melody Canton

Extols.


Her name is Sienna

Like the color artist’s mix

When simple red

Promises nothing of

Complexity

In its parts—

But complexity

Is the only way

To convey the

Whole.


She walked into his life—

No, she swam instead

Like a pirate

Fallen out of a ship

Whose pockets were filled,

Whose lungs nearing empty

Needed Canton’s

Breath to make it

To the shore with no

Patrol.


Canton wrapped his arms

Around her belted waist

He pulled her body

Wet with salted

Memories

To a warm and sunny

Place where

Resuscitating Sienna

Became his starring

Role.


He breathed his life

Into her lungs,

Sienna’s breast inflated

Like a blowfish

Reacting to her fear

Desperately wanting

His protection—

No, that’s not right—

His affection wrapped up in his

Soul.


Canton died when Sienna

Slept—

The world collapsed

With her unconsciousness

As though slumber

Was a distance too far to

Bare,

Not even the moon

Could console his emptied

Control.


He died when she blinked,

He could not withstand the dark

Her eyelids commanded—

Like a conductor

Setting the rhythm of

His pain and

One and two and three and

Four—

The music behind her open eyes, Canton’s

Parole.


Canton and Sienna

Clasped their fingers together

Like two pirates searching for love

Crossing a windy expanse—

They cried and laughed

And died and lived

Along the way

Two shipwrecked halves navigating

Toward one mysterious

Shoal.

© Jill Szoo Wilson, 2025