Life During Wartime

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Filling the bathtub

took an hour.

We knew something was up

when the pressure dropped

to a trickle

and the pipes inside the walls

rumbled, shook the house

like tanks passing in the street.

A call to Public Works

brought the Service d'Aqueduc

in maroon trucks.

We welcomed them anxiously,

booted, gloved, helmeted men

like a conquering army

equipped for battle.

 

A February freeze

followed by a surprise surge 

in degrees; 'probably a line 

break, we'll have to tear up 

your land,' the chief said. 

'Shut the main.'

Didn't take long 

for the digger to arrive,

attack the snowpacked soil

with a giant prehistoric claw,

the mechanized beast roared 

as it cut a trench,

desecrating 

the property line.

Thickly parka'd bodies 

lowered behind black

ice-laced mounds,

heads disappeared

like they were searching 

for buried treasure. The sun set 

and the temperature 

plummeted. 

When they reemerged, the elder 

of the group declared, 

good news/bad news.

The good news is there's no leak.

The bad news is

we'll have to keep the water shut

till we find the problem.

Another day without water. 

I thought of the First Nation communities

up north

where they live on the shore 

of pristine frozen lakes, 

and haven't had clean water

in decades.

Wife looked pale.

I reassured her, said

with a smile, 

'Life during wartime'

because I knew it wasn't.