Reviewed by Elana Wolff White by George Elliott Clarke Gaspereau Press, 2021; 252 pages ISBN: 9781554472307 In his new collection of poems, White, George Elliott Clarke expands his quartet of ‘colouring books’—Blue, Black, Red, and Gold (yellow) to a quintet, or, as he biblically submits: “a Pentateuch!” White, … [click for more]
Review
NEW Review Page posts
Review: The Green Archetypal Field of Poetry: on poetry, poets and psyche by Stephen Morrissey
Reviewed by Cynthia Coristine Poetry is the soul’s DNA; poetry is the soul’s map. – Stephen Morrissey The Green Archetypal Field of Poetry: on poetry, poets and psyche by Stephen Morrissey, Ekstasis Editions, 2022 In The Green Archetypal Field of Poetry: on poetry, poets and psyche, Montreal poet Stephen … [click for more]
L’affaire George Elliott Clarke: Review of J’Accuse!…! (Poem versus Silence)
Reviewed by Stephen Morrissey J’Accuse…! (Poem versus Silence) George Elliott Clarke Exile Editions, 2021 The title of George Elliott Clarke’s book length poem, J’Accuse…! (Poem versus Silence), is borrowed from Emile Zola’s 1898 letter “J’Accuse”, published in L’Aurore newspaper; Zola’s intention was to expose the injustice committed against Alfred … [click for more]
Review: The Untranslatable I by Roxanna Bennett
Reviewed by Padmaja Battani The Untranslatable I by Roxanna Bennett (Gordon Hill Press, 2021) Roxanna Bennett’s newest book of poetry The Untranslatable I is a saga of ineffable pain that follows wherever they travel. Their work is an exhaustive struggle in explaining restraints of disabled body and the meagerness of language … [click for more]
Review: Bricolage: A Gathering of Centos
Reviewed by K.V. Skene Bricolage: A Gathering of Centos by A. Garnett Weiss (Aeolus House, 2021) A. Garnett Weiss’s Bricolage is a truly beautiful publication – inside and out. The cover art, ‘Cathedral Forest’ by Diana Gubbay, is a superb significator for this recent addition to Aeolus House’s book list. … [click for more]
Review: Shape Taking by Elana Wolff
Reviewed by Lynn Tait Shape Taking by Elana Wolff (Ekstasis Editions, 2021) Colour, art, fairytales, surrealism, humour—whether writing about the whites of eggs or bird poop as colour or description, Elana Wolff brings us into her poems with word craft, narrative and beauty. Colour weaves through these poems in blues, whites, … [click for more]
Review: Becoming History, A Life Told Through Poetry by Blaine Marchand
Reviewed by David C. Brydges However good the usage of words may be, a poem with nothing to touch the heart is like a wooden doll clad with finery and no feeling. It is much better to express feeling with plain words than no feeling with just fine words. … [click for more]
Review of Keeping Count by M. Travis Lane
Reviewed by Marguerite Pigeon Keeping Count by M. Travis Lane (Gordon Hill Press, 2021) How can we think about aging and death? As frightening inevitabilities—matters of dread? As processes we’d prefer to wish away or hand over for biomedical oversight (at least in some cultures)? In Keeping Count (Gordon … [click for more]
Review of Cattail Skyline By Joanne Epp
Reviewed by Michael Edwards Cattail Skyline by Joanne Epp (Turnstone Press) Joanne Epp’s Cattail Skyline (Turnstone Press, 2021) is her second poetry collection. The book is an attentive and intimate poetic treatment of the Canadian prairie landscape. Her poems are immediate and mindful and often steeped in a … [click for more]
Two Voices: A Review of The Blue Moth of Morning by P.C. Vandall
Reviewed by Louise Carson The Blue Moth of Morning by P.C. Vandall, The Porcupine’s Quill, 2020. It wasn’t until I reached the last pages of The Blue Moth of Morning, in the section entitled Stage Four: Moth, that I began to understand the structure and/or intent of the poet and/or … [click for more]
Review: footsteps in the garden by Bob Mackenzie
Reviewed by Vanessa Shields footsteps in the garden by Bob MacKenzie (cyberwit.net, 2021) Bob MacKenzie’s latest collection of poetry, footsteps in the garden is for settling in. This is a collection that wants your time and attention for its spirographic dances with words in a plethora of gardens, both … [click for more]
Review: The Language We Were Never Taught to Speak by Grace Lau
Reviewed by Padmaja Battani The Language We Were Never Taught to Speak by Grace Lau, Guernica Editions, 2021 The Language We Were Never Taught to Speak, debut poetry collection by Grace Lau is an intensive attempt in discovering concealed elements of immigrant inheritances. It also depicts the themes of … [click for more]
Review: Metastasis by Josie Di Sciascio-Andrews
Reviewed by Emma Odrach Metastasis by Josie Di Sciascio-Andrews (Mosaic Press, 2021) Insightful. thoughtful and timely Josie Di Sciascio-Andrews says in her preface poets are “the antennae of their times”. She is correct and her poems prove it. But they are not optimistic, rather, they come with an outcry against … [click for more]
Review: Wild Hope: Prayers and Poems by John Terpstra
Reviewed by Carol MacKay Wild Hope: Prayers and Poems by John Terpstra (St. Thomas Poetry Series, 2020) John Terpstra’s book of prayers takes its title from the final line of “The Kind of World We Live in,” the first poem in his collection. This Lenten poem was written pre-COVID-19 but … [click for more]
Review: Thimbles by Vanessa Shields
Reviewed by Josie Di Sciascio-Andrews Thimbles by Vanessa Shields (Palimpsest Press, 2021) In poetry, everything has a deeper meaning. A thimble as a mythopoetic symbol evokes a sense of immunity and self-protection against the pain and bloodletting of life’s allegorical needles. It is a shield against pain. Interestingly, the … [click for more]
Review: Haiku in Canada: History, Poetry, Memoir by Terry Ann Carter
Reviewed by Philomene Kocher Haiku in Canada: History, Poetry, Memoir by Terry Ann Carter. Victoria, BC: Ekstasis Editions, 2020. 170 pp. Rarely do books appear that embody a decade’s worth of dedication. And perhaps it is also true, that each book that is published represents that author’s whole life. Haiku in … [click for more]
Review: Locked in Different Alphabets by Doris Fiszer
Reviewed by Pearl Pirie Locked in Different Alphabets by Doris Fiszer (Silver Bow Publishing, 2020) I’ve had the privilege of seeing some of these poems as they developed since Fiszer and I overlapped for a time in the same writing group. I’ve read some iterations of the poems in her … [click for more]
Review: The Muse Sings by Dennis Cooley
Reviewed by Pearl Pirie The Muse Sings by Dennis Cooley (At Bay Press, 2020) I’ve long admired the playfulness of Dennis Cooley. The Muse Sings is his 21st book. His abcedarium (University of Alberta Press, 2014) has a freewheeling sort of swirl of concrete poetry and it continues in this … [click for more]
Take Heart: A review of Nothing You Can Carry by Susan Alexander
Reviewed by Chantel Lavoie Nothing You Can Carry by Susan Alexander (Thistledown Press, 2020) The title hints at the spiritual grappling with the material in Susan Alexander’s new collection, Nothing You Can Carry. It also relies on the important verbs in that phrase: is that which cannot be carried valuable … [click for more]
The World is Always Being Born: Review of Blood Rises by David Haskins
Reviewed by Patricia Keeney Blood Rises by David Haskins (Guernica Editions. 2020) At the breathless top of the world along the arduous Inka trail, “Condor, oldest of all flying creatures” brought the sun on his back to banish darkness and fear. David Haskins’ transforming late life ascent into Machu Picchu … [click for more]
Review: sfumato by David Stones
Reviewed by Kamal Parmar sfumato by David Stones (Blue Moon Publishing, 2021) In the book sfumato, the poet David Stones, writes poems that are very powerful and precise, reflecting on things that are often unnoticed. Each poem is a masterpiece so thought provoking and an in-depth study of life’s, … [click for more]
Just Cross: a review of Windfor by Allan Briesmaster
Reviewed by Louise Carson Windfor by Allan Briesmaster, Ekstasis Editions, Victoria, 2021 As I was curious about the origin of the title of the book, I flipped ahead to the title poem, which lies roughly at the book’s half way point. This is what I found: a poem full of … [click for more]
There’s Art In Dying: a Review of Uncharted by Sabyasachi Nag
Reviewed by Josie Di Sciascio-Andrews Sabyasachi Nag. Uncharted. Toronto, Ontario: Mansfield Press, 2020. Whether in the animal kingdom or amongst humans as a metaphorical prodigy, a white tiger is a rare, ferocious wonder, born only once in a blue moon or a century. Such is the pervasive impression that lingers … [click for more]
An Appreciation: review of Mirrors and Windows by Anna Yin
Reviewed by John Robert Colombo Very seldom these days do avid and adventurous readers come across a volume that meets both needs: the need “to delight and instruct” (Sir Philip Sidney’s requirements for poetry) as well as the modern collector’s joy in finding a book that is not only a … [click for more]
Review: Walking Across The Day by d.n. simmers
Reviewed by Michael Edwards Walking Across The Day by d.n simmers, New Westminster, BC: Silver Bow Publishing, 2020. Vancouver poet d.n. simmers published his third collection of poems, Walking Across the Day, with Silver Bow in 2020. Entering into the book, the epigraph comes from the title poem, offering the … [click for more]
Strange Ways: a review of The Hammer of Witches by Kelly Rose Pflug-Back
Reviewed by By Louise Carson The Hammer of Witches by Kelly Rose Pflug-Back, Dagger Editions, 2020 One of the things I liked about The Hammer of Witches was that it made me look stuff up. As in the title of the first poem – ‘Malleus Maleficarum’. MM is a … [click for more]
Final Breaths on the Tongue: Review of Gianna Patriarca’s To the Men Who Write Goodbye Letters
Reviewed by Renée M. Sgroi Gianna Patriarca’s latest poetry collection, To the Men Who Write Goodbye Letters (Inanna, 2020) balances the universal and the specific. Using feminist and multilingual lenses, Patriarca’s poems are, like the stones she has written about in a previous poetry collection, unapologetically hard-edged, honest, and as … [click for more]
Review: The Dance Between: Poems About Women by Susan Ioannou
Review by Kate Marshall Flaherty first published in Verse Afire, January 2021. The Dance Between: Poems About Women by Susan Ioannou Opal Editions, pp. 72 paper ISBN 978-0-920835-54-8, 2019 eBook eISBN 978-0-920835-55-5, 2021 The Dance Between is a suite of spare and striking poems about women, in various … [click for more]
Review: For the Love of Lazaros by Susan Ioannou
Reviewed by Ronnie R. Brown first published in Verse Afire, January 2020. For the Love of Lazaros by Susan Ioannou Opal Editions, 54 pp. paper ISBN 978-0-920835-53-1, 2019 eBook eISBN 978-0-920835-57-9, 2021 Susan Ioannou is a name very familiar to readers of all aspects of Canadian Writing—children’s literature, … [click for more]
Review: The Other Life by Pat Connors
Reviewed by Jeevan Bhagwat In his debut poetry collection, The Other Life (Mosaic Press, 2021), Patrick Conners takes us on an introspective journey that seeks to find meaning and purpose in the sometimes mundane aspects of everyday life. Following in the footsteps of such luminaries as Al Purdy and Milton … [click for more]
Review: A Near Memoir: New Poems by Penn Kemp
Reviewed by Katerina Fretwell A Near Memoir: New Poems, Penn Kemp’s elegant chapbook, features her father’s portrait of her at 14 on the cover. Photos and art invite the reader into family dynamics. Fitting for a memoir, Kemp’s poetry expands Heidegger’s perception that “nearness slows the future’s approach, creating room … [click for more]
Review of Niagara & Government, by Phil Hall
Reviewed by Marguerite Pigeon “I have compounded another thingamajig,” exclaims Phil Hall partway through his recent collection, Niagara & Government (Pedlar Press, 2020). The thingamajig in question is a scavenged toy compass that Hall has fit inside a bottle cap, to his great satisfaction. But it also stands in for … [click for more]
Many Shadows, review of In the Shadow of Vimy: Poems, New and Selected, Stewart Donovan, The Nashwaak Press, 2021
Reviewed by Louise Carson We know right away after reading the first poem of In the Shadow of Vimy that the book is not going to be a paean to war. Despite its innocuous title – ‘Picking up Pies at St. John’s Anglican’ – the poem plunges the reader into … [click for more]
Review: Me, You, Then Snow by Khashayar Mohammadi
Reviewed by Kate Rogers The poems in Khashayar Mohammadi’s new poetry collection, Me, You, Then Snow, skillfully evoke the surreal nature of everyday life as the young narrator searches for self-understanding in our age of profound uncertainty. The poems explore the evolving self without self-centeredness. An epigraph from Khurdish-Iranian … [click for more]
Uncharted: Sabyasachi Nag Uncovers New Territory
reviewed by Pat Connors There are certain canonical books to which I always return, as they have an almost scriptural appeal to me. Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s passing led me to read parts of Poetry as Insurgent Art for at least the twentieth time. Poets of Contemporary Canada 1960-70 (edited by Eli … [click for more]
Review: Poisonous If Eaten Raw by Alyda Faber
Reviewed by John Vardon Ever since my mother died almost two years ago, memories of her surface into consciousness at all times of the day, evoked by events and objects both trivial and significant. I suspect that the same process was at work as the motivation and impetus for most … [click for more]
Review of Locked in Different Alphabets by Doris Fiszer
reviewed by Allan Briesmaster Locked in Different Alphabets by Doris Fiszer (Silver Bow Press, 2020) Books of poetry that combine family history with autobiography have been appearing often enough in recent years to form a notable sub-genre. Locked in Different Alphabets is an excellent instance of such “memoir poetry.” … [click for more]
Review: Wind on the Heath: new and selected poems by Naomi Beth Wakan
Wind on the Heath: new and selected poems by Naomi Beth Wakan Shanti Arts Publishing, Brunswick, Maine 2020 Softcover, 219 pages, ISBN 978-1-951651-55-8 $18.95 USD www.shantiarts.com Plato said, ‘the unexamined life is not worth living’. The poems in Wind on the Heath are all about the examined life. Naomi … [click for more]
Review: China Suite by Julie de Belle
Reviewed by Sandra Stephenson Here is a little book I read with a haiku mind. A haiga mind, really, as the pages are accompanied liberally with photos by the author, of her near-year in China teaching English. Stationed in Jiaxing, The longer poems at the beginning of the book … [click for more]
Review: This White Nest by Frances Boyle
Reviewed by Kim Fahner This review was originally published by Prairie Fire, Jan 28, 2020. In the title poem of her newest collection, This White Nest, Frances Boyle poses the question “What shines?” This is the question that sits with the reader as they make their way through the poems, but others … [click for more]
Thursday’s Child: Review of The Marta Poems by Susan J. Atkinson
Reviewed by John Vardon Originally published by The New Quarterly As a poetry editor for The New Quarterly, I first encountered Susan J. Atkinson’s work when reviewing forty applications for an Ontario Arts Council grant about two years ago. Among the poems carefully excerpted from in-progress manuscripts by writers both … [click for more]
Review of Serve the Sorrowing World with Joy by Meg Freer and Chantel Lavoie
Reviewed by Frances Boyle Serve the Sorrowing World With Joy by Meg Freer and Chantel Lavoie (Woodpecker Lane Press, 2020). This lovely short book by Kingston authors Meg Freer and Chantel Lavoie was written to honour an order of nuns who have been carrying out community service in their … [click for more]
Time Will Tell: a Review of The Eleventh Hour by Carolyn Marie Souaid
Reviewed by Josh Quirion My grandmother’s got two vertical freezers so full of food, it’s her house I’m running to when the four horsemen of the apocalypse descend. Nothing she does is accidental. If she makes a hundred eggrolls, she knows exactly how many she’s giving away, and how many … [click for more]
Review of To the Men Who Write Goodbye Letters by Gianna Patriarca
Reviewed by Caroline Morgan Di Giovanni Toronto poet Gianna Patriarca’s new book, To the Men Who Write Goodbye Letters, has arrived at a propitious moment. The world is going through a terrible pandemic causing sickness and death across wide populations, requiring officials to impose lockdowns, mask-wearing and isolation. No one … [click for more]
One Poem – A Review of A Beautiful Stone: Poems and Ululations by Lynda Monahan and Rod Thompson
Reviewed by Louise Carson After reading A Beautiful Stone, and then the poem on the back cover – ‘Following the Way’ – four stanzas, eight lines – it occurred to me that I could have just read that one poem then written this review. I’m not being cruel or facetious. … [click for more]
Review of Parramisha by Frances Roberts Reilly
reviewed by Bob MacKenzie. In firmly holding onto the desire to love and cherish one another we keep faith with many who have gone before us, by honouring those we have lost. —“Forged in Fire” Many poems are written to be engraved into the texture of paper, inked … [click for more]
Accessible, a review of The Vivian Poems: Street Photographer Vivian Maier, by Bruce Rice
Reviewed by Louise Carson. I’d seen a documentary about this woman, a Chicago nanny, born 1926, died 2009, who never seemed to want to display her work, but who saved much of it. It was found after her death. But I’d forgotten about her until reading the preface to Bruce … [click for more]
Sageing, Wider and Deeper: Penn Kemp in Conversation with Jane Munro
by Penn Kemp. The Words Festival has been one of London ON’s liveliest cultural events, presented annually since 2014. But this year, “WordsFest.ca 2020 was presented online in the belief communities need the transformative power of the literary and creative arts now more than ever.” Through Zoom, the event reached … [click for more]
Review of DREAM FRAGMENTS by Mirabel
Reviewed by Catherine Morrison DREAM FRAGMENTS is an incredible collection of poems that bring readers into her mind, experiencing the vibrant and intimate thoughts she experiences in her sleep. A reflection of self, of history, and future, Mirabel’s poems are extremely approachable, allowing readers to connect to a thought or … [click for more]
Book Review: Glass Float by Jane Munro
Reviewed by Marguerite Pigeon. In her last collection, Blue Sonoma (Brick Books, 2014), Jane Munro used dreamscapes and reportage as paper and pen to trace jagged contours of meaning during her husband’s dementia and death. Those poems were sober, plainspoken—and won Munro a Griffin Poetry Prize. Six years later, Munro … [click for more]
Review: Swoon by Elana Wolff
Reviewed by Kate Marshall Flaherty Swoon by Elana Wolff. Guernica Editions, 2020, 94 pp, ISBN 978-1-77183-507-7 Elana Wolff explores the many layers of ecstasy and everyday-ness in her powerful collection of poems, Swoon. In her epigraphs, Wolff depicts swooning as the physical manifestation of an emotional moment in time, as … [click for more]
Straddling the Third Wall: A review of footlights by Pearl Pirie
Reviewed by Louise Carson. Straddling the Third Wall: A review of footlights by Pearl Pirie, Radiant Press, Regina, 2020. Hide-dingle. (Word marriage.) Dictionary, dictionary. Hide’s nuances I’m pretty well up on – a poet hiding in a poem; skin as hide; a place from which to observe others – dingle’s, … [click for more]
Apples and Oranges, Plastic and Screens, Crows on Utility Poles: a review of Fiona Tinwei Lam’s Odes and Laments
Reviewed by Crystal Hurdle Lam’s third poetry collection, Odes and Laments, surprisingly sweet, offers an equal measure of elegies and odes, sometimes in the same poem. The opener, “Libation,” concludes, “What’s held within/this cup, this poem, this juice/I offer you.” The poem could be container or contents, and what does it matter? Everything … [click for more]
Meditations on Steffler’s Forty-One Pages
Review of Forty-One Pages: On Poetry, Language and Wilderness by John Steffler Reviewed by Antony Di Nardo In his latest book, Forty-One Pages: On Poetry, Language and Wilderness, a collection of forty-one anecdotal essays and a handful of poems, John Steffler defies you to draw a dividing line between … [click for more]
Review of Understan by Gavin Barrett
Reviewed by Patrick Connors Gavin Barrett lives a life with many layers of creativity. Much of his service to poetry is organizational, such as in curating the Tartan Turban Secret Readings, a series which prides itself on diversity and providing opportunity to visible minorities. However, his writing has also garnered … [click for more]
An Expectation of Enlightenment: walking the Camino
Review of The Way History Dries by Keith Inman Reviewed by John B. Lee “Than longen folk to goon on pilgrimages, And palmers for to seken straunge stronds, To ferne halwes koweth in sondre londes …” Lines from ‘The General Prologue” to Canterbury Tales Geoffrey Chaucer … [click for more]
Unhappy, Women Write Poems: A review of Folding Laundry on Judgment Day by Miller Adams
Reviewed by Louise Carson This was a difficult book to read. Not because the poems are inaccessible, or boring, or ugly, but because they are so sad. It’s a book length elegy for a life, all lives – for life itself. It was exhausting to read. (Or did I bring … [click for more]
Review of Devolution by Kim Goldberg
reviewed by Carole Mertz. Kim Goldberg writes surrealistic poetry that sometimes incorporates formal poetic forms. Many of the 60 poems in this collection use animals or anthropomorphic beings to convey their frequently apocalyptic messages. Shifts from the concrete to the abstract often startle the reader. You will not find cliches … [click for more]
Music, Art, Mortality – A Review of Sue Chenette’s Clavier, Paris, Alyssum
Reviewed by Louise Carson. I must have been feeling a bit rebellious the morning I picked up Sue Chenette’s recent collection Clavier, Paris, Alyssum, and, reading out of order (shocking!), began with the central section: Paris. Mainly because I saw it was the shortest of the book’s three sections, a … [click for more]
What the walrus said: a review of Claudia Coutu Radmore’s rabbit
Reviewed by Louise Carson. While Claudia Coutu Radmore may not talk “Of shoes and ships – and sealing wax – of cabbages and kings”, she does, in rabbit, her latest collection of poetry, cover parrots, Elizabeth Bishop’s childhood, Fogo Island, Montreal history in the 1950s, anatomy, geology, folk art – … [click for more]
In the 4 a.m.: A Review of Arleen Paré’s Earle Street
Reviewed by Clayton Longstaff two women together alone in the luminous house When you look out your window, what do you see? Are there trees? (how many?) Birds? (ever-fretting pigeons, circling the feet of passing pedestrians? Or are they predatory where you live—a turkey-vulture, perhaps, solitary, perched on … [click for more]
That Sinking Feeling: in the broken boat with Daniela Elza
Reviewed by Louise Carson. It was with a sinking feeling in my gut that I started to read Daniela Elza’s the broken boat. Oh no. The end of a marriage. The loss of a husband, intimacy. The breaking of something that the poet had thought would last forever. My own … [click for more]
Up North with Gillian Harding-Russell, a book review of In Another Air
Reviewed by Louise Carson Geography. Do we want poems of a geographical nature? Sure we do, especially in Canada, where we grapple with so much of the stuff. And I love geography. One of my fondest memories is of the whole of my Grade 4 class, under the benign … [click for more]
Of Light: A Review of Jude Neale’s Impromptu
Reviewed by Cynthia Sharp First Published by The Miramichi Reader Jude Neale encouraged me to write with her through National Poetry Month and I caught the fever, her own original prompts the ones that flowed most easily. Like the collage of hearts and stars on the cover, Impromptu is an explosion … [click for more]
Review: Common Brown House Moths by Laura Zacharin
Reviewed by Marguerite Pigeon Pests lurk through the pages of Laura Zacharin’s assured first collection, including lice and the titular moths. Nagging, unsettling, preoccupying to the point of distraction, these domestic nuisances are symptomatic—but of what? An unnamed woman in the poem “Common Brown House Moths” can’t shake a dread … [click for more]
A Tender Timeless Space: a review of Bruce Kauffman’s an evening absence still waiting for moon
Reviewed by Louise Carson You know a book of poetry has possibilities when the opening epigraph is seven lines from W.S. Merwin’s ‘Ancient World’, which function as a kind of extended haiku, beginning, “Orange sunset/In the deep shell of summer” and ending with “…the sound of a door closing/And at … [click for more]
Review: Love’s Lighthouse by Anna Yin
Reviewed by Susan McMaster May 2020 Anna Yin’s new book of poetry has exactly five English words on the cover – her name, the title, Love’s Lighthouse, and the ISBN if you count that as a word. It is, however, covered in Chinese characters in red and black placed in … [click for more]
Review: Salt Bride by Ilona Martonfi
Reviewed by Vanessa Shields Martonfi’s fourth book, Salt Bride (Inanna Publications, 2019) is a collection of poetry that begs for companionship. This is not a collection for the faint of heart nor for the reader who doesn’t know her human atrocities his[her]story. The Salt Bride is a deep dive into … [click for more]
Review: heft by Doyali Islam
reviewed by Carole Mertz This review appeared June 2019 at Dreamers Creative Writing. A prolific history lies behind Doyali Islam and her approach to writing poetry. While we may not fully understand the method she applies, we can appreciate the resultant strength of her compositions and respect the idiosyncrasies of … [click for more]
Scotland Forever: a review of The Walk She Takes by Neile Graham
reviewed by Louise Carson Full disclosure. I don’t know Neile Graham, creator of the poems in The Walk She Takes, but I do know Scotland, the subject of the thirty eight poems in this book. I don’t know it as well as Graham, who has visited multiple times to … [click for more]
Review: Undiscovered Country by Al Rempel
Reviewed by Adrienne Fitzpatrick This review was first published in Thimbleberry (Volume 4, Summer 2019) Rempel’s book arrived in the mail in late August, in the still bright summer. I was still slow with the heat. It was deep into October when I first read through it and it was … [click for more]
Review: Treaty # by Armand Garnet Ruffo
Reviewed by Marguerite Pigeon Treaty # opens with a prose poem, “Impetus Ungainly,” in which Armand Garnet Ruffo manipulates language from a 1905 treaty between the British Crown and Ojibwe, Cree and members of other Indigenous groups in Ontario. The poem’s title hints, bitingly, at the treaty’s function. It was … [click for more]
Review: Ego of a Nation by Janet Rogers
Reviewed by Miles Morrisseau Janet Marie Rogers’ 7th book of poetry is her double album and it may become her classic. Rogers, who is Mohawk and Tuscarora, is a gifted poet and she has written the book that Canada needs to read in 2020. The year we see clearly: if … [click for more]
Review: We Are Malala: poems and art by Katerina Vaughan Fretwell
Review by Penn Kemp A Canadian artist muses on Malala Yousafzai in poetic dialogue Katerina Vaughan Fretwell, We Are Malala: poems and art. Inanna Press “We realize the importance of our voices only when we are silenced.” —Malala Yousafzai On the day I read Katerina Vaughan Fretwell’s We Are Malala, … [click for more]
Review: Cold Metal Stairs by Su Croll
Reviewed by Marguerite Pigeon Dementia might seem like the anti-muse: not creative inspiration, but its sapping. Yet, in her new collection, Cold Metal Stairs, Su Croll follows dementia—her father’s—as it pulls her vicariously, clanging and spiralling downwards, through grief, fragmentation, and fear. The poems in this collection enact the repetitive, … [click for more]
Review: A Poet’s Journey: on poetry and what it means to be a poet by Stephen Morrissey
Reviewed by Cynthia Coristine Poetry is the voice of the human soul, speaking across time and distance – Stephen Morrissey In A Poet’s Journey Montreal native Stephen Morrissey shares four decades of insight about what it means to be a poet and the process by which a poet can discover … [click for more]
Review: Pretty Time Machine: ekphrastic prose poems by Lorette C. Luzajic
Reviewed by Bill Arnott The whole ekphrastic thing’s morphed somewhat since Greeks coined the term, describing art based on other art – adding creative layers, facilitating praise to enrich the overall experience. Like bacon. The addition simply makes things better. This artistic endeavour, however, represents life. Everything has a facet … [click for more]
Learning from Pier Giorgio Di Cicco (1949-2019)
Introduction by Diana Manole Pier Giorgio Di Cicco’s poems have always brought me the enjoyment of spiritual grace strongly grounded in sociopolitical and cultural activism. I’ve taught his work in all my Canadian Literature courses, while also emphasizing his contribution to helping Canadians become aware of the very existence … [click for more]
Review: Against Forgetting by Keith Garebian
Reviewed by Elana Wolff “A poem can hold more mysteries more easily than any factual timeline,” writes Naomi Shihab Nye — 2019-2020 Young People’s Poet Laureate of the Poetry Foundation of Chicago. Nye’s line aptly describes the holding-effect of Keith Garebian’s intricate documentary voice in Against Forgetting — a collection … [click for more]
Review: River Revery by Penn Kemp
Reviewed by Bill Arnott London Ontario’s my home. In part. Lived there two years. Important years. Growth years. It’s why I feel kinship, connection with the community and the meandering multi-named river that sews it together. I feel the same for the Laureate Emerita that truly calls this place her … [click for more]
Review: Joe Batt’s Arm and Other Islands by Shayne Coffin
Reviewed by C.S. O’Cinneide Location. Location. Location. Joe Batt’s Arm and Other Islands follows the poet Shayne Coffin on a US-Canadian road trip where he uses destination as lyrical inspiration, be they as culturally significant as the house of Ralph Waldo Emerson in Massachusetts or as comically crass as a highway … [click for more]
Review: Local Heroes by Penn Kemp
Reviewed by Jennifer Wenn Local Heroes by Penn Kemp is an “eclectic collection” (from the introduction) of pieces celebrating a range of fascinating people from London, Ontario, and the wider Southwestern Ontario region (or Souwesto, a term popularized by James Reaney, one of those honoured in the Tributes section). A … [click for more]
Review of Sunrise Over Lake Ontario by Josie Di Sciascio-Andrews
Reviewed by Joyce Wayne Di Sciascio-Andrews’ poetry reminds me of the Canadian nature poets who created the bedrock of the poetic tradition in this country. Archibald Lampman comes to mind and the way he commented on late nineteenth century social pretensions and manners by writing poetry about nature. In Sunrise … [click for more]
Review: Radiant by Kate Marshall Flaherty
From The Trinity Review By Grace Ma Edited by Antonia Facciponte Read the review on The Trinity Review here The first poem of Kate Marshall Flaherty’s Radiant, “Welcoming Angels,” begins with: “I will not see cancer as an enemy / nor foreign intruder, / but a passenger pigeon, (not extinct), / … [click for more]
Review: These Wings by Kim Fahner
Pedlar Press| 2019 | 80 Page | $22.00 | Purchase online Reviewed by Vera Constantineau First, let’s talk about the physical aspects of this poetry collection. These Wings is as light as a feather—no pun intended. Inside the smooth cover the feel of the pages is surprisingly substantial, like a … [click for more]
Review: Radiant | By Kate Marshall Flaherty
Inanna Publications | 2019 | $18.95 | Purchase online Reviewed by Lesley Strutt Kate Flaherty’s collection of poems in Radiant is an uplifting treatment of one of life’s most excruciating experiences – cancer. Rather than drifting into self-pity, Flaherty finds a moment in almost every poem to celebrate being alive. When … [click for more]
REVIEWING THE SHORTLIST: Welcome to the Anthropocene | By Alice Major
University of Alberta Press | 2018 | 136 Page | $19.95 | Purchase online Reviewed by Jenny Haysom Reviewing the Shortlist is a weekly series in which poets shortlisted for our 2019 Book Awards review books written by their peers. Join us for this series until the award winners are announced on June 8, … [click for more]
REVIEWING THE SHORTLIST: Ledi | By Kim Trainor
Book*hug | 2018 | 108 Page | $18.00 | Purchase online Reviewed by Jennifer Zilm Reviewing the Shortlist is a weekly series in which poets shortlisted for our 2019 Book Awards review books written by their peers. Join us for this series until the award winners are announced on June 8, … [click for more]
REVIEWING THE SHORTLIST: Unstable Neighbourhood Rabbit | By Mikko Harvey
House of Anansi Press | 2018 | 72 Page | $19.95 | Purchase online Reviewed by Jim Nason Reviewing the Shortlist is a weekly series in which poets shortlisted for our 2019 Book Awards review books written by their peers. Join us for this series until the award winners are announced … [click for more]
REVIEWING THE SHORTLIST: Listen Before Transmit | By Dani Couture
Wolsak & Wynn | 2018 | 90 Page | $18.00 | Purchase online Reviewed by Klara du Plessis Reviewing the Shortlist is a weekly series in which poets shortlisted for our 2019 Book Awards review books written by their peers. Join us for this series until the award winners are announced on June 8, … [click for more]
REVIEWING THE SHORTLIST: The Missing Field | By Jennifer Zilm
Guernica Editions | 2018 | 80 Page | $20.00 | Purchase online Reviewed by Kim Trainor Reviewing the Shortlist is a weekly series in which poets shortlisted for our 2019 Book Awards review books written by their peers. Join us for this series until the award winners are announced on June 8, 2019! In … [click for more]
Review: Little Red | By Kerry Gilbert
Mother Tongue Publishing | 2019 | $19.95 | Purchase online Reviewed by Bill Arnott Grey. That was the day. Like most November days in Vernon, BC. Bundling against cold, I made my way from Sveva Caetani’s pleasantly haunted mansion across a downtown where I lived, worked, and grew up … [click for more]
Review: The Way of Haiku | By Naomi Beth Wakan
Shanti Arts | 2019 | 110 Page | $15.95 | Purchase online Review by Janet Vickers, author of Infinite Power (Ekstasis Editions, 2016) “Outside of truth there is no poetry” Uejima Onitsura” This quote, by Onitsura, is one that Naomi Beth Wakan uses to begin her introduction to haiku-writing and … [click for more]
Review: This Kind of Thinking Does No Good | By Alison Smith
Gaspereau Press | 2018 | 64 Page | $18.95 | Purchase online Review by Annick MacAskill Cerebral, funny, and insightful, Alison Smith’s third full-length poetry collection, This Kind of Thinking Does No Good, reads as an extended response to the feminist maxim “the personal is political.” Picking up on … [click for more]
Review: Homeless Memorial: Poems from the Streets of Vernon | By John La Greca
Ekstasis Editions | 2018 | $23.95 | Purchase online Reviewed by Bill Arnott The first twenty years of my life I lived in Vernon, BC. I had a home. Which I usually took for granted. It was where I returned most nights, save for sleepovers and one night in … [click for more]
Review: Insomnia Bird by Kelly Shepherd & Fox Haunts by Penn Kemp
Insomnia Bird by Kelly Shepherd Thistledown Press | 2018 | 112 Page | $20.00 | Purchase online Fox Haunts by Penn Kemp Aeolus House | 2018 | 98 Page | $20.00 | Purchase online Review by Alice Major In two recent collections, urban wildlife becomes a context for … [click for more]
Review: Shards of Crystal | By Fern G. Z. Carr
Silver Bow Publishing | 2018 | 98 Page | $23.95 | Purchase online The Musicality of Stars: Shards of Crystal Reviewed by Cynthia Sharp. Originally published on Canadian Poetry Review’s Facebook page. I’ve been a fan of Fern G. Z. Carr’s work for years, whether it’s orbiting Mars or … [click for more]
Review: Practical Anxiety | By Heidi Greco
Inanna Publications | 2018 | 104 Page| $18.95 | Purchase online Double the Pleasure: Heidi Greco’s Practical Anxiety Review by Susan Ioannou When Inanna Publications announced Heidi Greco’s newest collection Practical Anxiety, it blurbed that the poems “dwell in the hearth of domesticity.” I was intrigued by the title, especially … [click for more]
Review: Checking In | By Adeena Karasick
Talonbooks | 2018 | 96 Page | $16.95 | Purchase online Reviewed by Jake Marmer for Tablet Poetry, at its core, is a mystical endeavor: an encounter with the web of language that holds our consciousness. This is true even if the poem, on the surface, seems like a series … [click for more]
Review: The Heart of All Music: Poems about Music and Musicians | By Stanley Fefferman
Aeolus House | 2018 | 52 Page | $20.00 | Purchase online Reviewed by Penn Kemp for Bywords Convergence is a word often used to describe the reshaping of our world by such forces as the Internet. This concept also applies to Stanley Fefferman’s latest collection, The Heart of All Music, … [click for more]