Diana Hayes was born in Toronto and has lived on the east and west coasts of Canada. She received her B.A.(UVic) and M.F.A. (UBC) in Creative Writing. She has seven published books, including “Sapphire and the Hollow Bone” by Ekstasis Editions (2023) which was a finalist for the Sunshine Coast Poetry Award. She launched Raven Chapbooks in 2019 and publishes small edition poetry chapbooks featuring BC poets. She lives on Salt Spring Island—the traditional and unceded territory of the Hul’q’umi’num’ and SENĆOŦEN speaking peoples.

Postcards from Sitka            57.0532° N, 135.3346° W

It was July all summer. You’d taken a post north.
Sitka’s fine arts camp, painting Bashmakoff in words,

stealing afternoons to trek the Cross Trail
up to Indian River Falls in day long’s light,

eleven miles out-and-back, muck boots and shirtless
mist floating the river’s tableau, The Sisters stalwart.

Mary Ida in camp that year teaching mixed media
the mystery of fire trees calling her vision deeper,

beacons for mariners, preserving fire for heat—
Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian stories told.

Today you walked the cemetery, two centuries old
the graves mostly hidden, smothered in devil’s club.

Headstones from the ballasts of Russian ships.
The tomb of the princess without a name.

Last night you dreamed a mournful wail and tremolo,
a Great Northern Loon in the fall of night. West by North.

Deathwatch at Ogden Point              48.4151° N, 123.3841° W

I’m back at Ogden Point tracking your steps
watching three ravens tilting in the thermals

three lines scribbled and now faint
intonations lifting between stanzas—

that night the pilot boat circled, circling past
the occulting light, out in torrent waves

a child’s handmade mittens and Lily doll
tossed in a tantrum, the tiny red dress bobbing

while the breakwater shuddered a tempest howl
I walked and paced with no moon to navigate

my undoing had little to do with gales
or fright but caught by Mesmer’s spell

I shouted for a Kisbee ring, the ketch Astral long departed
from her berth, tacking past Neah Bay and Tatoosh—

a note tucked between pages, memory’s deathwatch
now a dream’s reach in a following sea.

Looking in the Margins            48.4940° N, 123.7124° W

Where have I been these mornings
scouting stones, tracing maps

not by the den’s cozy hearth
lit up and slow-burning—

memory of an old shake roof under moss
this journal’s sleight-of-hand

amulets and antlers on the mantel
another day awash in the scent of cedar

old Leechtown where I waded in a dream
sipped cool water in the margins

the bowl’s rim and my thirst attuned
an ouzel’s burbling medley of song

water-walker with feathered oars
diver on the brink of a stream

the old trestle’s coordinates lost
heavy with nostalgia and the scent of gorse—

Oh sleep, come back to the roost
I am all fog falling beyond the water.