New Adventures in Terraforming
by Steve McOrmond
It never rains in Moscow on parade day.
Military cargo jets seed the approaching clouds.
Meanwhile, cancer never takes a holiday.
They really do ask if you’re sitting down.
Change your reality, the mantra of Silicon Valley
scrawled on the yoga studio’s chalkboard wall.
What if the deus ex machina comes a day too late?
A new spot on the scope. Smaller than your fingernail.
Men blow the tops off mountains for less.
Vows we repeat without knowing their size.
Back home, the cat curls up on your lap.
On the news, the usual scenes of unrest.
You’re a terrible liar, or so I’d like to believe.
You use the same password for everything.
Start taking pottery lessons. Plant milkweed.
Your idea of putting one’s affairs in order.
As a boy, I’d arrange the comforter just so
to alter the topography of my bedroom floor.
Cotton-poly ridges and peaks encircling
an enemy fortress made of LEGO bricks.
Outnumbered, outgunned, a little squad
of toy soldiers advances on command.
Steve McOrmond is the author of four books of poetry, most recently Reckon (Brick Books, 2018). A new collection, The Shutdown Sequence, is forthcoming in spring 2027 as part of the Oskana Poetry & Poetics Series published by University of Regina Press. His work has been anthologized in Best Canadian Poetry (Tightrope Books, 2016; Biblioasis, 2026) and On Occasion: Poems for the People (Coach House Books, 2026). Originally from Prince Edward Island, he lives in Toronto.