The Big O


The article in the North Shore News and your on line book brought back a flood of memories from the ‘best time of my life’ 1969-1974. There was of course my lowest point following a divorce, which included a two week stay at the Olympic Hotel in about 1970. I recall that they refused to serve me in the coffee shop because they thought I was a Narc. I wrote the following poem one night while staring at the ceiling and listening to the brutal thump of the bed upstairs and the periodic weeping and wailing of a drunken hooker. I also remember the loud music… It wasn’t my finest hour.

 

Olympic Hotel Rm 9

 

There’s a drop

from my ceiling

up there

where

the paper’s peeling

 

I wonder where it comes from

Up yonder above the glum

 

It drips

Through a headline

up there

where

old paper’s hang

 

I ponder where it comes from

And fonder love the slum

 

It drips

from a feeling

up there

where

the sky is kneeling…

 

Jim Cathcart, North Vancouver