O Mississauga,
No one could accuse you of having too short a skirt.
Not content to be an outskirt, you have developed outskirts all your own.
Wide, expansive outskirts. Generous in size if not in spirit.

But I do not see any of the giants these oversized everythings were designed for.

We lost radio contact with group B.
They went in search of a quaint coffee shop with hipster appeal.
They were last seen wandering across a 12 lane side street
Toward a parking lot paved with the yearly asphalt export of 4 and .5 continents.
Send help.

Pedestrians are ants here.

We lost radio contact with the help.
They were last seen at the local Tim Hortons
(An easy eight hour walk from the highway)
Trying to make change for the bus.
Send Russ.

Pedestrians are arctic explorers.

Russ doesn’t have a radio.
He will contact you when he needs to.
His beard was last seen rimmed with ice.
His tent pitched in the middle of a parking lot the size of something… really big. Just downright immense. You had to be there.
We think he’s looking for a new job.

The ministry of scale has got their wires tangled.
There’s a bungalow that has its own stock exchange.
It’s up 10 points since the margins got so well-padded.
Now the parking lots are being widened.

Reports of a sighting.
Local children emerged from the air conditioned siding to kick over a construction pylon.
Put it back and kick it over again.
Put it back and kick it over again.
Put it back and kick it over again.
I don’t know what it means but it happened.
They were never seen again.

Mississauga’s cartoonishly oversized ultrabold outline cannot be escaped by foot.
But why would you want to?
This is an ode.
So…
I love you.