The Literary Blog of Amanda Earl

above/ground press broadsheet #309 by me

2012-01-24T14:12:00.002-05:00

is now also on line on the above/ground press blog. it's an homage to the poetry of Phil Hall. thanks to rob mclennan for publishing my poem...

[photo by Charles Earl]

Spring Poetry Releases continued

2012-01-24T12:03:00.004-05:00

The Smooth Yarrow - Susan Glickman, Vehicule Press

Wolsak and Winn Publishers:

We, Beasts - Oana Avasilichioaei

Floating Life - Moez Surani

& a new edition of John Terpstra's Naked Trees illustrated with the stunning woodcuts of Wesley Bates.

plus a scoop on their upcoming W&W fall poetry titles:
Einstein's Cat by Zoë Landale
and Jeanette Lynes' new collection, which is tentatively titled "Archive of the Undressed."

Coteau Books

Anne Szumigalski- A Woman Clothed in Words (fiction, playscripts, essays & poetry)

Poetry (& more!) for the End of the World

2012-01-20T08:23:00.004-05:00

Arts Court, 2 Daly Ave, 7pm – late: cover $8 DOORS OPEN AT 6:30pm

this is a jam packed event, folks & it's a fund raiser for the delicious VERSeFest, a week-long extravaganza of poetry that takes place from February 28 to March 4, 2012.

at some point you will find me at the mic doing a few apocalyptic riffs. i love the lypse. that is to say it provokes & inspires...

Sweet resonant voice. Cello, Guitar. Bass. possibly mandolin. Apocalyptic Poetry. Weather Balloon. VERSeFest tees. O'Meara, Matthews, Douglas, de Pape. libations. incrEdibles, electro geetar. irreverent absurd comedic lyrics. we have to pack all this in before the world ends…

you can take a gander at the event line up on the V-fest site.

I leave you with my Singing the Apocalypse play list.

"One day you're waiting for the sky to fall/and then you're dazzled by the beauty of it all." (Thank you, Bruce Cockburn)

Air Out/In Air: Poets for the Guatemalan Stove Project

2012-01-16T08:46:00.002-05:00

Thursday, January 19, 2012-7pm; Collected Works Bookstore & Coffeeshop, 1242 Wellington W.

i shall be reading along with Allison Armstrong, Mike Montreuil, rob mclennan & Luminita Suse.

Dear Ottawans, i hope to see you.

Bywords Warms the Night IX

2012-01-12T12:20:00.003-05:00

Our ninth annual fundraiser for the Cornerstone Women's Shelter Sunday, January 15, 2012
2:00 to 3:00 pm
Collected Works Bookstore & Coffee Bar,
1242 Wellington St. W
with music by
Andrea Simms-Karp
& poetry by
Jamie Bradley, Abby Paige & Luminita Suse
[cover photo by Lee Mousseau]

For every donation to the hat, we will give you a copy of the winter issue of the Bywords Quarterly Journal & our thanks.

Cornerstone provides emergency shelter and supportive housing for a diversity of women.

• $21 will feed one woman for a week
• $84 will feed her for a month
• $840 will feed 10 women for a month
• $100 will provide one month of addiction or mental health counseling services for a woman in recovery from the effects of trauma and abuse
• $200 will sponsor a woman in our iSisters computer training course
• $75 will provide a homeless woman with the support of our Housing Worker in her search for safe and affordable housing that she can sustain when she leaves the shelter.

Contact: Amanda Earl - amanda at bywords dot ca; Twitter: @bywordsdotca

Quill and Quire's Spring Preview

2012-01-10T05:25:00.003-05:00

includes forthcoming poetry by M&S, Mansfield Press, ECW Press & more. plus a whole bunch of other exciting stuff, including a new novel by Daniel Allen Cox & a new short story collection by Steven Heighton. huzzah!

click here

forthcoming poetry titles - Insomniac Press

2012-01-06T21:09:00.004-05:00

here are the poetry titles coming out this spring with Insomniac Press. very excited about these.

Marcus McCann, the Hard Return

Natalie Zina Walschots - DOOM: Love Poems for Supervillians

a partial list of 2012 forthcoming poetry titles

2012-01-06T16:04:00.003-05:00

this is what i've been able to gleen so far from publisher sites & e-mails, & online articles. i shall add more as i hear of more. the forthcoming poetry collections range from autobiography, illness, travelogue, superheroe skullduggery, selected collections, experimental whimsy & so forth...looks like another creative & inspiring year for poetry. hurray! please help me fill in what's missing, publishers, authors & author stalkers/groupies.

DC Books
In the Vision of Birds - Steve Luxton
The Lower Provinces - Daniel O’Leary

Véhicule Press
Sumptuary Laws - NYLA MATUK

Brick Books
Omens in the Year of the Ox - Steven Price
Monkey Ranch - Julie Bruck
Between Dusk and Night - Emily McGiffin
I see my love more clearly from a distance - Nora Gould

Coach House Books
Divide and Rule - Walid Bitar
New Theatre - Susan Steudel

ECW Press
Echo Gods and Silent Mountains - Patrick Wood

House of Anansi Press
Erín Moure - The Unmemntioable

Guernica Editions
Rooms the Wind Makes - James Deahl
Foreignbody - Catherine Lalonde, translated by Nora Allyn
The Bones of His Being - Sue Chenette
For the Maintenance of Landscape, Selected Poems - Mia Lecomte, translated by Johanna Bishop and Brenda Porster

Insomniac Press
Doom - Natalie Zina Walshots
The Hard Return - Marcus McCann

Palimpsest Press
Hummingbird - John Wall Barger
Origins - Darryl Whetter

Porcupine's Quill
Wayworn Wooden Floors - Mark Lavorato
The Essential Robert Gibbs - selected by Brian Bartlett
Words for Elephant Man - Kenneth Sherman

Turnstone Press
sonar - Kristian Enright
Monstrance - Sarah Klassen

Arsenal Pulp Press
Impact - Billeh Nickerson

Recent Reads: Fiction

2012-01-05T09:39:00.002-05:00

Shag Carpet Action. Matthew Firth. Anvil Press, 2011

Firth is known for his gritty tales of average joes, working class drudges, thugs & bullies, the jerks we knew in high school, voyeurs, masturbators & bus riders. This collection composed of a few stories plus the novella "Dog Fucker Blues" continues along this vein. I particularly enjoyed the novella & hope Firth continues to try longer forms. I'd like to see a novel. "Dog Fucker Blues" is an intense & compelling work about the tension of a city trade union. There are drugs involved, biker gangs, murder, drudgery of the working day & politics. Firth is a skilled storyteller. He's great at dialog & his descriptions make me wonder if he shouldn't be writing screen plays & turning this good shit into movies. There are some surprising turns in his stories. In "Action" a woman fucks herself with a Spider Man action figure while a voyeur watches. In "the Rookie and the Whore" a guy watches his Lacrosse buddies take turns fucking a local groupie. There's lots of violence in Shag Carpet Action. Characters are always trying to deal with seething resentment, their disenchantment with their lots in lives. Sometimes these resentments explode. That's when the fun begins. Firth doesn't mince words, he minces them up.

JEW. D.O. Dodd. Exile Editions, 2010

I read this book in one day. It's a compelling & terrifying book about a man who wakes up buried alive in a pile of dead bodies & manages to get out only to discover he's in the middle of a war. It's a disorienting book because the protagonist doesn't know anything about himself & we learn as he does. He finds a man who looks like himself, shoots him & takes his uniform, his gun & his vehicle, drives into a horrible town where soldiers are in charge. This is a fast-paced, horrifying story that has an allegorical feel. There is a war. It is a religious war. Certain terms are used like "Jew" & "Jihad.".Dodd is an excellent writer who thrilled me with this tale & made me shudder in disgust. I will read more of Dodd's work.

the Cube People. Christian McPherson. Nightwood Editions. 2010

Another book I read in a day, the Cube People is about the life of an Ottawa civil servant who is also a writer. He & his wife are going thru fertility treatment. McPherson describes the embarrassments & frustrations & joys of that process. These are the sorts of things people don't talk about in public & it's frustrating how private people can be about such. Good on McPherson for dealing with this in his novel with humour & pathos. The story centres around the drudge & absurdity of working as a civil servant while trying to start a family, have a good marriage. The characters McPherson describes are versions of civil servants Ottawans encounter on a regular basis. The book also talks about the protagonist's struggle as a writer. The rejection letters the protagonist receives are funny; publishers are peculiar eccentrics & we also see the appearance of the famous & prolific Canadian icon Maggie Woodlawn. McPherson's protagonist writes a novel called the Hungry Hole, so that we get to read a story within the story. It's a fabulous technique & creates amusing situations, such as when , the main character's mother in law arrives & she's a hideous bitch, he writes a chapter in which the main character's mother in law is swallowed up by the hole. It's a fun book, but it is also a touching account of a couple's struggle with wanting a family, with their marriage, with trying to balance work & home, pot addled side-kicks, having to find a way to photocopy forms to fill out forms to get permission to use the photocopier, those icky cheese nachos at the 7-11 & the insatiable void that drag us into its blackness.

The Mountie at Niagara Falls and other brief stories. salvatore difalco. Anvil Press. 2010

I'm not quite finished this yet, but might as well add it into the mix. these are short shorts from a paragraph to a couple of pages. difalco takes a microscope to life & gives us eccentric portraits of people, places, things. he's very articulate with a fine sense of language. also love the illustrations by Francesco Gallé. I noticed the back of the book blurbs focussing on the whimsy of this book & that's true, but I wouldn't want the fanciful stuff to overshadow difalco's keen observation skills & his gift for the understated.

Front & Centre Issue 26. Black Bile Press, 2011

If you don't have a subscription to Front&Centre (2 issues for $10/4 issues for $18), go here & get one. I'm not finished reading the issue yet, but I'm already blown away by the first story, "A Gathering of the Clan," by Raymond Soltysek, about a man who's attending a funeral, the taboos & transgressions that have taken place within that fucked up family. It's a powerful story & will have me searching out Soltysek, a writer from Glasgow, Scotland. Where in hell would I have ever encountered such a writer if not for Front & Centre? What I like about this magazine is that it presents excellent stories that deal with the hard stuff nobody talks about & by writers you don't see in the standard Canadian literary journals. For the past couple of issues, there have also been great interviews at the start of the issue. It's where I learned about difalco's book above. This issue features an interview with the publishers of Siren Song, a small press out of Montreal. It's inspiring to see how small press publishers are so driven to publish. It's rewarding for me as a reader to discover great writing. Black Bile Press run by Matthew Firth & Bill Brown is doing a great job at this. There are also interesting reviews of books that go unnoticed by the Globular Mail & the National Pissed.

100 blessings to start 2012

2012-01-04T21:05:00.002-05:00

1 Charles
2 dear friends
3 shelter: our lovely light-filled aerie
4 food: especially Charles' baked goods
5 good health
(esp the success of my surgery in January & end to appointments at the Ottawa General & Billings Bridge We care)
6 integrity
7 hot & cold running water; being able to take a hot bath/shower
8 a comfortable king sized bed with a colourful & cozy duvet
9 being able to spend my weekdays writing; especially thankful to grant agencies; in 2011 OAC Writers Reserve
10 being able to publish talented artists & writers via Bywords & AngelHousePress; thank you contributors
11 being able to attend readings, such as the wonderful festivals: Writers Festival & Versefest, the A B Series, the Factory Reading Series, Plan 99…
12 being able to attend small press fairs: ottawa small press book fair & the Meet the Presses fair in Toronto.
13 Charles' photography on line & in the Draught gallery
14 small press publishers both on line & in print who publish my work
15 bloggers who write about my work or comment on my blog posts & creations
16 poetry & visual poetry
17 novels
18 non fiction
19 real books & bookstores
20 music-especially local musicians
21 art-especially the National Gallery, local galleries & great photography by so many
22 film & good tv shows
23 the radio, especially the CBC, CKCU & CHUO & most especially Podcasts, Penn's Poetry Radio
24 tea
25 Charles' strong coffee
26 the red moleskine journals Charles buys me, starting in the hospital
27 the internet, especially great blogs such as rob mclennan's, Pearl Pirie's & Jamie Bradley's.
28 tomatoes
29 sushi
30 dim sum
31 living downtown
32 being able to walk or take the bus most places
33 being debt free
34 having no mortgage, no house maintenance & repair bills, no heat & hydro bills, no property taxes
35 having no car (no car repairs, no car repair bills)
36 memories of dear friends who are no longer with us, their music, their art, their writing
37 not having to shovel snow or mow a lawn or scrape a windshield or dig up the ground or weed a lawn
38 not having to travel via airplane
39 being able to play my guitar, & a coupla new songs in 2011
40 coming back to pottery after a seven year break
41 whimsy
42 three ply tissues & good toilet paper
43 a variable temperature tea kettle
44 magic bag
45 the office I share with Charles
46 my plaid waterproof winter boots
47 my 30 year old or so red plaid flannel shirt (hole in elbow means it's headed for its demise)
48 playing games with Charles: Scrabble (Lexulous on FB) & Cribbage
49 knitting
50 eavesdropping in cafes & the fodder it yields for poetry
51 honey crisp apples
52 trips to Montreal & lovely time at friends' wedding
53 the Ottawa photowalk in the fog & rain
54 no pets, no plants, just full on human nurturing & being nurtured by same
55 graffitti
56 Ron Sexsmith's concert at the First Baptist Church & in store the next day
57 being able to eat popcorn again
58 hallways & stairs I can climb to keep healthy
59 chip truck fries in a paper bag (in the foggy misty autumn)
60 colds & flus are now just colds & flus
61 my IPOD
62 catching snow flakes on red mittens
63 Raw Sugar Café
64 my fountain pen
65 So Good
66 nuts, any kind of nut: cashews, almonds, macadamia, brazil, peacan, walnut
67 honey
68 harmony
69 Neko Case, Bronson Centre
70 baked goods of dear friends
71 leisurely chats over Thai food with dear friends
72 English songs covered in other languages
73 Photoshop, which is fun to make vispo with
74 shelves & shelves full of books
75 the Ottawa Public Library
76 the University of Ottawa Library - Morissett
77 the gerbera daisies given to me by a dear friend
78 long walks listening to Lightnin Hopkins, Howlin' Wolf, Townes Van Zandt, ballads & blues
79 Bob Dylan
80 Tom Waits
81 the train
82 the #4 bus, which now runs from my place to the Rideau Centre & back
83 crazy buttons & bling for my bag
84 my label maker
85 Jian Ghomeshi - CBC RADIO - Q
86 Kate Bush 50 Words for Snow
87 peanut sauce
88 Thai sticky rice
89 coloured magic markers with which to doodle
90 noodles of any kind
91 Charles' homemade pizza
92 grateful for those who are not gender biased
93 Ottawa Start's weekly round up of events
94 the crows in a line at 4 o'clock pm
95 the lack of pigeons on the balcony
96 the new bike path on Laurier & Bixi bike rentals
97 seafood udon soup & ramen noodle soup
98 frozen vanilla yogurt
99 Funk Yer Junk
100 living in the now

[much thanks to Pearl Pirie for the inspiration to count my blessings]

new work over at the Railroad Poetry Project

2011-12-31T11:35:00.002-05:00

thanks to editor Amanda Eades for including three of my more fanciful poems, written this year & also republishing some of my visual poetry from the series Paradise Lost, first published in the Drunken Boat visual poetry issue in 2009. read the issue here.

this is the third issue of the new online mag & they're looking for more, so send to them pronto.

here's a bit of their mission, cribbed from their site:
"Based in the U.K., Railroad Poetry Project was founded by a writer of ‘beat’ poetry who is sixty-something years late and on the wrong side of the pond. The experience of writing poetry that rarely fits the criteria of most publications and presses encouraged the poet to seek out folk with a similar problem. It quickly became evident that there are many talented and frustrated poets facing the same issue: receiving rejection letters that give such feedback as ‘It’s just not for us’ and ‘whilst I enjoyed reading your poems, which were very interesting, I’m afraid, the style does not fit that of the press.’ The problem is, for poetry that works outside of current trends and contemporary styles, there are few places to submit."[...]

Favourite Chapbooks of 2011

2011-12-28T17:12:00.001-05:00

Chapbooks are 32 pages or less, according to the UNESCO definition. They are usually sewn or stapled, but they can also be perfect-bound, I suppose. They are often printed in a limited edition, hard to get hold of except for at small press fairs or passed by writers & publishers in dark corners of bars. They can be typed, word-processed & laser-printed, photocopied, collaged, written out in lead pencil or crayon or calligraphy pen. Basically they can be anything. For some reason this year I purchased no chapbooks from No Press, derek beaulieu's wondrous small press. otherwise I'm sure there would be chapbooks from such on my list. Here's a list of chapbooks which I acquired this year & enjoyed. They were touching, intricate, elegant, humourous, whimsical, elevated, down in the gutter, imaginative, personal, playful, rebellious wee books made by publishers with some of those same characteristics. [& a small word of joy & praise for Christine McNair's "Notes from a Cartywheel" published by my own AngelHousePress.]

Cameron Anstee - She May Be Wary (St. Andrew Books)

Judith Copithorne - Brackets & Boundaries {Concrete & Other Accretions} (Returning Press, Vancouver, BC)

Pearl Pirie, Between Stations (obvious ephiphanies press)

Stuart Ross - Cobourg Variations (Proper Tales Press)

rob mclennan - C. (little red leaves textile editions)

After the Mountain: the A.M. Klein Reboot Project, Compiled and Edited by Jason Camlot (Synapse Press) [disclaimer, i have pome in here]

Air Out / In Air : 21 Poets for the Guatemala Stove Project, edited by Pearl Pirie (phafours) [disclaimer, i have pome in here]

above / ground press
Paige Ackerson-Kiely - Book About a Candle Burning in a Shed
Dennis Cooley - have you learned nothing Kroetsch
Ben Ladouceur - Lime Kiln Quay Road
Shannon Maguire - Vowel Wolves & Other Knots

Apt. 9 Press
Jim Smith - Exit Interviews
Emergency Response Unit
Nicholas Lea - Actual Girl

Book Thug
Alessandro Porco - The Minutes I-X
Mark Truscott - Form

Pooka Press
Catherine Owen - what is on your mind?
Gregory Betts & others - Three Words Per Poem: Collaborative Poetics from Inside the Book

my fav fiction of 2011

2011-12-27T20:02:00.002-05:00

I haven't read a lot of fiction from 2011 so I'll call this a favourite list rather than a best of list. & just to be difficult or paradoxical or rule-breaking or something like that. what I like in fiction is fairly straight-forward: compelling stories, characters I can care about in some way (even loathe), not a lot of fooling around with narrative alas. & if the author's style is so odd & heavy-handed that I can't get past it & therefore can't suspend my disbelief & get lost in the book, I tend not to enjoy it. here's the list of short story collections & novels that kept me happily turning pages in 2011.

Clark Blaise, The Meagre Tarmac (Biblioasis)

Matthew Firth, Shag Carpet Action (Anvil Press)

Helen Oyeyemi, Mr Fox (Penguin) (not sure this qualifies as Canadian, but I'll include it because it's so damn good)

Ami McKay, the Virgin Cure (Alfred A. Knopf Canada)

Lynn Coady, the Antagonist (House of Anansi)[i won this thru a CBC Books contest on Twitter. thank you CBC!]

& a special mention to the unputdownable books from 2010 that I read in 2011:
Krakow Melt by Daniel Allen Cox, Fauna by Alissa York, Lemon by Cordelia Strube, Sub Rosa by Amber Dawn, Annabel by Kathleen Winter, Sanctuary Line by Jane Urquhart.
finally particularly for fiction recommendations, but also for a bit of poetry & non fiction, I suggest you take a look at the fabulous Advent Book Blog.

ps. close viewers will note that a book pictured in the photo but not mentioned is "textual vishyuns, image and text in the work of bill bissett" by Carl Peters. this is not fiction, but it happened to be on my desk during book photo shoot. because i am reading it & enjoying it. i won it via CKCU's Friday Special Blend with Susan Johnston & the A B Series. thanks to them!

best of 2011-poetry: the rest of the best

2011-12-27T10:01:00.002-05:00

at some point, I would like to write more about the compelling, creative, whimsical, & resonant poetry collections of 2011, which seems to have been a banner year for poetry, & perhaps I will. for now here is my best of Canadian poetry 2011 list….first a small note on the idea of best of lists. I know, it's bogus to some extent. I haven't read all the poetry that came out in 2011, listened to all the music etc, etc, but I feel these best of lists are entertaining & useful. I read them to find out about books, music I haven't heard of. & even better if a bit of detail is provided.

furthermore personal recommendation by people I admire goes a long way to making me want to read a book or purchase a cd. we are in an era where having an opinion is frowned upon. I disagree with that. so I make lists of what appeals to me & sometimes I even provide deets. i'm willing to stand up & support work that I feel holds up to standards of excellence & even sheer joy.

I go to a lot of readings, poetry is one of the few things I spend money on & I don't spend it lightly because I don't have a lot. I think work that stands out is worthy of praise. & i think you should rush to your nearest indie bookstore & buy the titles below. here then is the whole best of poetry list for 2011 according to me. I'd love to hear about your favourite Canadian poetry books of 2011. tell me…

& if i end up enjoying the poetry collections you recommend which aren't on my list so far, at some point i may just write about them here too.

A Doctor Pedalled Her Bicycle Over the River Arno - Matt Rader (House of Anansi)

Post-Apothecary - Sandra Ridley (Pedlar Press)

Apollinaire's Speech to the War Medic - Jake Kennedy (Book Thug)

the id kid - Linda Besner - (Signal Editions)

Pillage Laud - Erín Moure (Book Thug)

Methodist Hatchet - Ken Babstock (House of Anansi)

The Porcupinity of the Stars - Gary Barwin (Coach House Books)

Killdeer - Phil Hall (Book Thug)

I Can Say Interpellation - Stephen Cain (with fabulous illustrations by Clelia Scala (BookThug)

Dance, Monster! - Stan Rogal (Insomniac Press)

Oyama Pink Shale - Sharon Thesen (House of Anansi)

Err - Shane Rhodes (Nightwood Editions)

Earworm - Nick Thran (Nightwood Editions)

The Material Sublime - Carleton Wilson (Nightwood Editions)

Patrick Lane - The Collected Poems of Patrick Lane (Harbour Publishing)

XMAS20110 5h45-19h45 HOURLY PHOTO CHALLENGE

2011-12-26T08:51:00.005-05:00

in response to Andrea's xmas hourly photo challenge. notice obsession with turkey, sleeping, turkey, cribbage, turkey...

Best of 2011: Poetry-Dream/Senses in Sandra Ridley's Post-Apothecary

2011-12-21T16:05:00.003-05:00

Post-Apothecary. Sandra Ridley. Pedlar Press.
in her interview with Michael Blouin over at Open Book Toronto, Sandra mentions that she has never been overly concerned with narrative but with tone & creating an atmosphere, the embodiment of emotion. she succeeds in creating a strong atmosphere with this book. somehow deftly she manages to communicate emotion thru the use of recurring imagery, onomatopoeic sound, & an appeal to all of the senses, including pain. the images are so sensory, so visual & emotive, I can imagine the poems being painted as individual scenes from fairy tales, with blood reds & moss greens. I admire Sandra because she does what many poets fail to do; she creates a tension, evokes the dark. it's not all pretty out there. yes, there is a prairie rose, but its petals have been plucked bare.

here's a bit of a jumbled play-by-play as I reread the book & try to type in my notes as I go. being occasionally distracted by the epigrams, by a word I have never heard before & then returning…

in the PROLOGUE, we begin with a she in a poem entitled "Pulse." notice the repetition, the disordered syntax, the medical terms, emotional terms. sparseness. don't bother saying what is obvious & yet it is there. couplets. tension between the real & the imagined.

the first section "REST CURE" begins with light--a Denise Levertov epigraph. poems in sequence numbered with lower-case roman numerals. much space on each page. repetition, mention of nightshade & wormwood, hawthorn, camphor, laudanum, plum cordial & corset gives an old-fashioned feel & the rhythm is incantatory. there is the outside, a topiary maze & then a he. what is real & what is metaphor. it's all very dream-like "his hand pressed/forward/to his switchboard/& mirror"

lovely lush & sensual language:
"A mirror-wrought fetch spins liminal, glooms
cryptic (ii. REST CURE)

lots of lax i's, long o's, diphthongs & short a's. & knowing when to break the long line into fractured pieces. adds to the fretting of the She. her disorientation.

this is a book to be read aloud in a quiet voice:
"In a cocoon of luna moth or star-shroud, she lies or wings there in her hectic flush,
tenterhooked & breathless -- coughs, seethes. (iv. REST CURE)

you get the impression of much research to get the era right. even though time isn't explicitly mentioned. "strapped to her hemlock pasteboard pocket flask" (ix. REST CURE). "Before Cerletti & Bini" (Tincture of Mandrake in APOTHECARY) to do with a new method of electro convulsive therapy back in the 20th C. (google says)…

in this book we have touch, taste, sight, sound & smell

sight is often obfuscated, rooms spin. Star whorl. "Moon slit slipping in & slipping out of gaunt pine" (Posset of Foxglove in APOTHECARY), a merry-go-round. there is ether mist & vapour. the colour palette is red, violet, black, pearl, Obsidian with mother-of-pearl, pale, cherry smoke, blue ribbons, red stripes & white, "When white is not white but blue-blue." (Restrain the Body : Rest the Mind, POST-APOTHECARY).

for touch the she is constantly shrouded by material, by night, smothered & restrained. we have textures: pine planks, lamb's wool, leather, plaster, silk, stone, slick wet fur, "A husk of blue-veined cocklebur" (Blood-let-APOTHECARY), suction cups, gooseflesh bristling, fat scraped off bone. withered branches suspended by chain, "when the worm twisted & twisted under wet gauze" (ii. PHANTASMAGORIA), the air wet with skin (Weaken : Swoon POST APOTHECARY), red palimpsest congealing on stone floor (O Ophelia : O Crazy Jane POST APOTHECARY).

for sound, there is silence, things are muffled & distant bells ring. voices recede. a sequence of broken glass, car crashes (Phial of Morphine, APOTHECARY), buzzing overhead

for taste: honey, syrup of violets, horehound & tar feather & cod liver oil. a bitter of angelica & artichoke with carbolic.

for smell, burnt tinge of mothball (ii. PHANTASMAGORIA)

the image of flowers recurs:
some of them are part of the treatment from an apothecary but others are not:
Willow-straw & wildflowers in sparrow-nested hair; a welt of primrose.
"A prairie rose./Pale bud plucked petalless." (O Opheilia : O Crazy Jane, POST-APOTHECARY)

the image of the fawn recurs. the image of a girl not found for days. (Anterograde : Retrograde, POST-APOTHECARY). wings. feathers.
at the end of REST CURE, the image of a fawn, "sun-struck" "hind legs buckling" (xii. REST CURE).

the space considerations are well thought out. every indentation, every placement seems to fit with the emotion & tone of the text, from long lines, to last fragments, hanging off the edge of the page.

APOTHECARY begins with walls, an epigraph from a poem of Nicole Brossard's. each poem in this section is titled. the poems have long lines, take up the entire top half of the page. the pace feels faster. in Blood-let, the first poem, there are hard b's & t's repeating & repeating. images become more violent in this section, dreams of a tree killer, deliberate destruction, containment behind barbed wire fences. frenzied delusions, again the tension between what is real & what is imagined. "Thin man with a broken accordion tips his top hat toward her & bows." (Decoration of Sassafras - APOTHECARY) "sparrow skull held between fingertips" (Paste of Bear Paw - APOTHECARY)

PHANTASMAGORIA begins with seeking & finding the you. an epigraph from an Adrienne Rich poem.

This short section is lower-case roman numbered prose poems with end stopped lines to make squares on the page. there is still a he & a she but suddenly an I and a my, an empty bed, his footsteps coming up the stairs. "my sugar cube in her mouth keeps his taste away." (iii. PHANTASMAGORIA). memories of the outdoors, black-eyed susans, a cold lake, swimming away. escape.

short uh sounds of the quick, short, tense breath. in & out. phrases punctuated by a colon. a sense of flight. liquid sounds, el & nasals em, continuous ess. (v. PHANTASMAGHORIA)

in vi. there is now a you and a me: "if you would have just talked & not/held me down & if she I were not I but you by those ivied walls."

POST-APOTHECARY begins with forgetting. an epigraph from Daphne Marlatt. forget. the poems in this section are titled. some go on for more than one page. some are prose poems, some are couplets, some are spaced to give the text room to breathe.

once more there is a you. & a she. a sense of awakening from a dream, from death. there is the catafalque, the calla lilies (Weaken : Swoon). "She is ready./She is ready." (O Ophelia : O Crazy Jane, POST-APOTHECARY). the I & the my become prevalent. poems become more linear, more narrative, less-fragmented. we return to repetition of the beginning: "Summon the body still moving at the edge of the road. Summon lung-song, nocturned breath. Summon howling… (Concatenation) until "Yes. I am breathing on my own./On my own. (Wounds : Sutures). we have the fawn, the she & the fawn come together in Concatenation & the my. moth & mouth. water returns from its earlier role when the she swims into a cold lake, floating her dead man. now "Water does not grab & hold her under./It is the depth & the cold & the dark that convinces her to close her hands.// Give in." (Current : Calm)

the EPILOGUE repeats the sentence: "I thought I heard a girl's voice in the woods." thirty times--twice on a line for 15 lines. daring. effective. chilling.

CLINICAL NOTE beings with a quote from the work of Dionne Brand. night. enclosure. a note. the author's last name, "Get a hold our yourself Ridley." the final line. "I am happy."

thru out the whole book, there is a sense of play with point of view, with the I, with the subconscious. if I knew more, I'd be writing about Jungian archetypes, power animals, water, stone & dreams.

a special note on the inner cover art, the gorgeous apothecary bottles painted by Holly Farrell.

I can't praise this work enough. there are layers & layers & layers. every time I go back to it, I find something more.

a happy nod also to Ottawa's own Apt. 9 Press, who published Rest Cure as a chapbook earlier.

I haven't yet had the chance to get myself copies of the other Pedlar Press poetry titles published this year but I am looking forward to them.

Peter F. Yacht Club Annual Regatta/Xmas Party

2011-12-21T07:20:00.001-05:00

The Peter F. Yacht Club regatta/reading/christmas party
lovingly hosted by rob mclennan;

with readings from yacht club regulars + irregulars alike, including: Amanda Earl, Pearl Pirie, Vivian Vavassis, Monty Reid, Janice Tokar, Roland Prevost, rob mclennan + possibly others,

at The Carleton Tavern (upstairs)
233 Armstrong Avenue (at Parkdale Market)
Thursday, December 22, 2011
doors 7pm, reading 7:30pm

copies of various issues of the journal will be available; check here for information on the journal, along with a bibliography

info: rob mclennan at 613 239 0337 or rob_mclennan (at) hotmail (dot) com

Best of 2011-poetry: Circles within Circles: Apollinaire's Speech to the War Medic by Jake Kennedy

2011-12-19T14:54:00.002-05:00

Apollinaire's Speech to the War Medic. Jake Kennedy. Book Thug.

In his BookThug interview, Kennedy says that the first part of the book is object studies inspired by the mid-20th Century French writer Francis Ponge, who bridged the gap between the essay and the prose poem with meditations on everyday objects; the 2nd section, Light & Char, is, according to Kennedy, a goofy way of trying to think thru some abstractions. Kennedy is fascinated by metaphor because it brings together two seemingly dissimilar things in a kind of magical way, which is thrilling, perhaps part of the inspiration for the book.

I think what fascinates me about the book right from the first poem, "Study of a Claw Hammer," is how image laden it is…the way Kennedy presents ideas in ways i hadn't thought of. & juxtaposes very unlike objects: "the opposite of the claw hammer/is the lapsed will,/a yolk that tears itself on the shell's tooth/and globs outside the pan". "There are a bunch of pronouns now, flashing. They live on a screen in the middle of the night." (The drive-in is Real); "lake of cigarette tinfoil/lichen of psoriasis…mud of a Datsun's interior/beehives of winter exhalations" (Forest Studies). "That's the pestle grinding raspberries for the passion; the lopped leg of the rabbit and the neck of the chicken, dripping into the offering bowl" (Blood Study); "the flies have the nature of asterisks spinning in turpentine." (On Death (Paint)). "the pitcher pored an absence into the glass while the shadow couldn't stick" (On Justice (Rooms)).

also the work tends to be very visual. & there are many references to visual art. i can imagine these studies as surrealist paintings or collages. "…the motes glide in on their incandescent beam - they drift between the spaces of the garbage drums." (The drive in is Real). "the moon comes through the eyes and courses down the black hill of the throat." (History of a Tiger); "the moment when a school of fish scatter in order to demonstrate shattering glass." (Displacements).

I am also thinking when I read this book about Jean Cocteau's Orpheus film trilogy, particularly Blood of a Poet, its mirrors & darkness, rooms of surprises, bells, a hand with a mouth & moving lips. this book is full of surprises, surprises of image, of motion, of geometry, of emotion.

& then there is the humour, for which Kennedy makes use of form poetry. take for example "Bushestina" with its short & simple declarative statements in the form of a sestina & you think to yourself, "what a good idea": "Texas is good./I love the place./You can barbecue./You can golf./I like dogs./I feel safe." or "Pantoum for Standard Keyboard"

the endings of the poem are sometimes dramatic, sometimes understated. you get the impression that Kennedy can apply a hard brake to a poem or a gentle tap. I get the impression of control. of fine pacing. a poem can be very fast all the way thru & then move into slow motion toward the end. take a look at the motion of this poem, "Study of a Dog Print in Snow":

Study of a Dog Print in Snow
the sun going down
teeth of the miter saw

explosion
in a prison wall

having been to a place
and needing to go on,

well, do it: exit
despite the bad-ass years

under a crown of shadows
with four drops of rain

falling into the mouth
of the stone well

the spatulate leaves
around the manhole

silhouette of the carnival wheel
before an eclipse

Apollinaire's Speech to the War Medic contains lots of shapes & motion, particular the cycle, a circle, broken or unbroken & the nest, the notion of containers & objects inside other objects, ideas within ideas:

"a yolk that tears itself on the shell's tooth" & the pan (Study of A Claw Hammer);
"within the acorns there are lanterns" - a nested image (Study of a Bowl of Squash)
the bowl, the squash, "here are the skulls/in a bowl made of apple wood."
"the mouth of the snake," "the mouth of the pot" (Study of 'Black Snake Pot')
the circle of argument in poems such as "Sea Study": "and so there is no solution. And so --",
the rotunda in (Newly Free Translation);
bike tires, coins, chalk (Study of a Subdivision Sidewalk);
" and the boat that turns on the anchor's axis also turns the/big and little hands of the clock" (Pallid Sortie, Sure);
"Wanting, seeking, and finding, we know, is not a linear enterprise. As the morning rises in the shape of an eyeball, all beliefs are new. The sunlight offers a version of the way the world used to see itself yesterday -- one way of illuminating the future, over and over again." (History of a Tiger);
"Luke and Hans both at a loss in site of a loss/as if working inside the irony" (Study of Town Dump).
"as in a cuckoo clock/that explodes its doors/with a boing of wires:" (Study of Steel Wool).
"it takes a turbine to animate the bodies" (Pastoral Poem);
the zero of the prime meridian (Study of Nail-Polished Toes): (always knew) how to walk barefoot/against the prime meridian//and all intimations/of immortality";
the screw, the red apple, the knee (After John Cage);
"That the owl knows exactly what will occur/merely by believing in circularity," the 360 degree spin, the feeling of déjà vu, "to look with scavenger eyes" (Nature Study);
"in order to experience panic, the tornado stills itself" …"there is a tenderness/according to the movements of the field//and according to the hours/that drum the moon across the sun" (After Viewing Cy Twombly's "Fifty Days at Illiam");
Tree Ring Study;
"a crystal bowl on the pond's floor" (Peace Talks);
"to put a hand on a circle/in order to feel like a god/wielding an ideal form" (Study of an Iron Frying Pan);
Nest Study;
"death amongst cornflowers" (Study of Butterflies);
"thought bubbles/ in want of text" (Sheep Study);
"one day the bullet will grow its own skull/and reside inside it" (Apollinaire's Speech to the War Medic);
the sun in the Preamble to Light & Char;
"And when the mother saws the rope from the son's neck…" (On Difference (Knots));
a cloud, a cyclone and the everyday swirl (On Linearity (Bridges)).

sound: a clinking streetlight, a runaway alley can (Lung-Beckett)
"the blocky voices" of hungry children (Open This Door)
"'not this, not this' being the sound of crows wings/worked against sugar air…"
"a clucking of rapids against rocks" (Study of Abstractions)
"Study of the Sound of Ripping Grass/(Handfulls)
"the rocks of the inukshu/clacking in the wind" (Sore Throat Study)

& then there is language, the speech act as unsatisfying, the gap between word and action, there is pain, there is grief & there is emotion. running thru all of the poems. Apollinaire's Speech to the War Medic, a bullet inside a skull, words within poems, inside a book, hurtling & nested inside the brain.

On Pain (Funerals)

for Georgie and Don Summerhayes

Cross-section of the ant farm: the Franklin Gothic in a
book set by a drunkard. It reads, uh, "What tree does the
blood fall from today?" Is that right? Out of a maple and
into a maple. Scooped, conciliatory as a canoe: use me,
because this coffin travels…Or, clicking off the Orpheus
radio. those who are expecting to be floating on gusts of
supremely good karma consider that even the darkest of
poems will never save the corpse from the rot of light and
air. So how does this work again: look up… stars tighten
into fists -- and they too can't hold on.

a small note on faith & scepticism

2011-12-18T08:37:00.002-05:00

as a writer of obscure poetry & creator of even more obscure visual poetry, it is in my nature to be sceptical. what I do is not part of the mainstream & doesn't fit in with societal convention about what I should be doing.

I question everything & can understand & relate to other's scepticism about religion & metaphysics. I am not a joiner, don't belong to any groups unless I am leading them or working with those with sympatico minds & values. as part of my vocation as a writer, I test & I push limits. & I can't abide any evidence of group mentality, such as is found too commonly via social media, alas.

however, as a creative person I also dwell in the land of metaphor & symbol. I can stretch my own imagination beyond the literal into the realm of mystery & the unknown.

I don't know what I believe in but I have faith. somehow the world moves forward. I recognize that it is a fucked up place, that we humans are responsible for the worst kinds of crimes against humanity, creatures & the earth. is there some greater force at work? I am not sure. empirically I can't prove it & yet I have faith.

while I was undergoing my health crisis, doctors told my husband that I would die. that was certain. I am still both incredibly grateful that I survived but also unnerved by how close I came. the delusions I experienced in the intensive care unit were excruciating & unbearable. I moved from one into another with a fucked up sense of time & location. & I moved from these nightmares into periods of blankness. frankly, these were what scared me the most…the oblivion. I believe that these moments were when I was closest to death. if I had died, the world would have moved on without me. while that is a sad thought, it is as it should be.

regardless of all the horror & mess of the world, it moves on. it will move on in some form long after we are all dust. I have faith.

as a final thought, I'll leave you with this story I heard many years ago:
a man sits in a bar and says to the bartender, "I know there's no god." the bartender says, "why do you say that?" the man explains that he was travelling up north when his car broke down. he stood in the cold & prayed to god to save him, but it didn't happen. the bartender asks, "how did you end up here?" the man says, "some guy came along on a skidoo & rescued me."

Best of 2011: Poetry: The Eye-&ear-ballery of Linda Besner

2011-12-12T13:41:00.005-05:00

the id kid. Linda Besner. Signal Editions, an imprint of Véhicule Press.

the book starts with a bit of dialogue between the devil & Bobby Gould from the David Mamet play "Bobby Gould in Hell" & sets up expectations for humour & hopefully dark humour.

Besner read from the id kid this year at Plan 99, the excellent reading series hosted by David O'Meara at the Manx Pub & this is the first time i'd ever heard her read. what struck me right away during the reading was Besner's sense of imagination, fun & play. she read one poem (i believe it was "Discarded Chairs") in a New York accent, not afraid to dare to try something madcap.

the book title was inspired by those commercials for the Ove Glove, causing Besner to play with the odd rhyme for other words. I enjoy Besner's sense of word play in such poems as Umbrella, the opening poem in the first section, Knick Knack. & her quirky descriptions, seeing objects from a point of view i hadn't thought of. Besner is good at the turn & the surprise ending. She also shows a lot of sass in her poems.

Besner is excellent at long lines, many of them punctuated by short phrases & sentences within the line. Many of her poems are about objects, especially those found on construction sites. We had a post-reading chat where we both admitted a love of construction sites. She gives these objects voices in poems such as Demolition Site: AIDS, 1990 with objects such as a plastic sheet, the scaffold & caution tape speaking, each with a different voice, different rhythms, different vocabulary. The scaffold, for example, has a rather lofty vocabulary, whereas the caution tape offers imperatives without preamble or hedging. The pit offers short & staccato lines with hard k sounds & dark imagery.

the id kid, like pop rocks, is fun for your mouth but it's much more than that. in the book, you will find wit, intelligence, self-deprecating humour, a sense of awe, wondrous word & sound play & a great sense of fun.

Besner reads Moonlight on Komatsu Extractor here.

i'll leave you with one of the poems from the book, but you should read Michael Lista's more erudite & comprehensive review of the book over at the National Post.

After the Operation

It was minor, really--a quick lancing of dense matter, removal
of obstruction to the cochlear passageway--

but now everything is in major key, every object
a previously empty house where, suddenly, frying pans sizzle

and toasters bolt awake, the kitchen window open
just at ear-level.

Pot-lids now clang, the gas stove lights with a whoosh, a quick
redness lands whistling on the bird-feeder, feathers aslant
to the wind.

Almost as surprising are things that look noisy, but aren't:

peach pits, their fire alarmish quills mute
unless tossed into a metal trashcan;

rocks, dumb unless shattering windows,
unless dropped.

Then the way some things steal sounds meant for others:

the thrum your curly hair ought to make displaced
onto the fuzzed bugling of bees;

your cheekbones' cymbal crash
the clarion clapping of keys.

What to make of the bodiless instruction to wit: to woo
delivered in darkness, a pinecone dropping as a branch lifts?

How odd that, skimming over the wet grass,
a voice and its thing come easily untwined, so we are still unable

to point out to each other, to say with certainty,
yes, that's it,
that one,
there--

a cardinal.

Best of 2011: poetry--Erín Moure: Belonging to Bliss

2011-12-07T14:14:00.003-05:00

Pillage Laud. Erín Moure. republished by Book Thug's Department of Reissue in 2011 & first published by Moveable Books in 1999.

in her Book Thug interview, Erín Moure describes her book as a pillaging and a praising, selecting from computer generated pages to create lesbian sex poems. sentences used as the unit of composition. back in 1997. rhythms. limited structure. emotionally compelling yet generated by machine. phrases that appealed underlined. text passing thru my human apparatus & i'm making a gesture, performative. combine phrases but used in the order in which they were generated. chapters come from place names, including an area on the dark side of the moon. ideal reader is anybody who hates clicées. the computer program is incapable of generating a cliché because it has no culture.

as someone who is driven crazy by clichés, by the wholesale swallowing by the masses of programmed convention, i am very happy about Pillage Laud & other attempts to avoid such. what i find in this book are surprising juxtapositions, a sense of play & transgression. Moure's work is always very daring, & this book is no exception. to attempt composition from computer-generation, to derive from it emotion & fun, even the idea of lesbian love / sex poetry. evoking Sappho. the work gives us a timeless quality of the modern & ancient eras.

what i enjoy about these poems is the unique & memorable imagery. the rare & beautiful gems are mined from text generated by machine. how the personal can come from the impersonal. "Her white pearl earring so base shimmered/Making daylight a realm of incandescence//I wanted to be that daylight/It was night & an earring was enough for me" PILLAGE 1 ("Oakland")

The book appeals to me in particular because for a long time now I have been interested in the poetic practice of chance operations, practiced by such poets as Jackson Mac Low in 22 Light Poems. He began with names for light & cross-matched them with playing cards & women's names. In Pillage Laud, Moure combines systematic method with intuitive choice, keeping phrases that appealed to her.

I love the sense of fun & whimsy in this book: "Don't violas count as vulva zombies?" PILLAGE 9 ("Burnside").

Language is a snapped yoyo, a dilemma between the pain and a failure, breaks out of restrictions.

There's so much in each poem, in each line, so much to ponder, so much that arises from the unusual combinations, that I find myself lingering. "Vocabularies were those empires./Wit inside wounds." PILLAGE 1.

The book is a lovely combination of depth & playfulness: "She is their watcher during the rules' restriction when/the clarinet is dreamed, the noun would surrender." PILLAGE 2 ("High Prairie"). I think about the role of language in society, the arbitrariness of naming, fixed expressions. how this work unbuckles, undoes convention. "Time travel meant: small indelible birds./ Until some were nothing, a dialect belongs to bliss."

There is so much sensuality in the book. & that sensuality is juxtaposed with the phrasing & vocabulary from various disciplines as art, psychology, music & science. "Certain theorems are the libraries of bitterness." PILLAGE 1 ("Oakland"). The vocabulary of narrative, libraries & the grammar of the text. "The muscle of her flesh was heat; my vagrants/are senses." ... "While you drank me, museums vanished." PILLAGE 3 ("Roselawn"). "My lover bends. No, means to bend. I tarnish her. This escapes. PILLAGE 4 ("Bowness").

The final two sections "In Tenebris, or The Gate" & "to exist is reading" are different from the rest of the book, outside of the vocabulary grids listed in the front of the book. "to exist is reading" is one block of uninterrupted text generated from the computer program, while "In Tenebris" feels like an afterword, a love poem, not a rationale or explanation but a kind of apologia.

I could spend this entire blog entry just quoting from the book, from individual & evocative lines. The whole work accumulates to create a symphony, or a collage. I am perhaps guilty of hyperbole here, but I can't help myself.

rob mclennan offers his own excellent engagement with Pillage Laud here.

Best of 2011 - poetry: the Gravity & Grace of Matt Rader

2011-12-05T16:29:00.003-05:00

This month i'd like to spend some time revisiting certain poetry books i read in 2011 & writing about them in a bit more depth than i have over the year with my incessant lists. i explore these books with you because they are works that have affected me, taught me a thing or two in my ongoing attempts to learn how to write poetry. i approach writing very humbly. i have no answers, only questions. sometimes i have nothing but joy in the language to express & share.

Often these works haven't had very much attention & this should be rectified. i am doing my small part to bring them to your attention... Note that these studies of mine will in no way be exhaustive, but will merely bring attention to certain aspects of a book that stood out for me due to my own interest in emotion, in sound & rhythm perhaps, in whimsy, in play, in imagery & other things I will learn along the way. I hope you take the opportunity to read the books for yourselves.

Matt Rader. A Doctor Pedalled Her Bicycle Over The River Arno. House of Anansi. I've written about this poetry collection already on this blog somewhere. Specifically about the wonderful sound play in poems such as "Gravity & Grace." Rader lends gravity & grace to the whole collection. Grief is well rendered.

I especially admire Rader's craft with long lines broken up by punctuation, by grammatical structure to add memorable rhythms that reflect the tone & subject matter of the poem. i ask the question-what is the rhythm of grief, how it interrupts, blends or doesn't with the every day. the powerful difficulty of grief mixed with getting on with life in "Ablution" for S.L. If you read just one poem from this book, read this poem.

I admire too the juxtapositions of war & horror w/ contemporary everyday life, such as in the opening poem "Music," or the next "The Latin for Hunger: "The year they uncovered our three-year-old/Neighbour silent in the wooded easement/Behind her apartment I learned to identify/Those trees by the Latin,..." & the way Rader closes his poems, ingeniously ties in the opening horror, the Latin tree names, love making, the grief following a brother's death.

What I love about these poems is their emotion, the vulnerability of the speaker. I relate to the intensity of the grief. The opening quote by James Agee from "A Death in the Family" epitomizes the humility of the voice in this collection: "All my people are larger bodies than mine, quiet with voices gentle and meaningless like the voices of sleeping birds...By some chance, here they are, all on this earth ... Remember them kindly in their time of trouble; and in the hour of their taking away." The long lines have tight sound & image play, the sound fun reminding me quite a bit of Marcus McCann's poetry. Take a look at the first stanza of "The Second Born":

A quiet ordeal. No gob of gawkers on the second go.
Only the slobber faced firstborn.
With the goat horn rattle and the goat
With one horn, the carpenter and the gobsmacked girl on her back.
In the barn goading the little god out of her
Through the open gate of her hips into the open ark.

--

I like this kind of attention to sound, a hint at formalish rhyme almost. It goes on with the repetitions of hard k sounds, open & lax vowel sounds, bumpy rhythms creating by the breaking of the line by punctuation or grammar, such as prepositional phrases & asides, lots of playful alliteration. This is beautiful & attentive soundcraft. Plus facility with language levels, switching from fairly formal in some poems to a colloquial language. Rader gives us tight disciplined syntactic structure plus strong descriptive imagery & mythological allusion.

There's lots of variety in this collection, take the whimsical word play of "Freaks, Irregulars, Defects Oddities." "Placido/Domingo/on the stereo with merlot/And fettucine alfredo."

Or the sensuality of "Ocean's Love to Oregon": "As the Pacific backs beach to cliff-face//Then surges against her into the mouth/Columbia, plashing her long neck, her caves/And coves caressed into shape//By his tongue, till all his ringlets are/Breathless sweat and scent blessing her linens/Of sand like incense, mist, lifting"

Not at the end of the book, but a poem that means a great deal to me for its honesty, is "I Acknowledge," which the poet read here in Ottawa at Anansi night during the Ottawa International Writers Festival. "I do not believe in property./ I believe in propriety." A beautiful moment. This poem is written in a very different style from the others, not concerned with any kind of rhyme or sound play but as a series of statements, such as one would find in a legal document. It has weight.

The weight of emotion in Rader's poems is why I keep returning. For example in "Present & Future," there's an accumulation of detail that leads to the culmination of the poem, its passion. I love this idea of alternating between the present and the future. How to move past the grief. Here's an excerpt from the poem, from one of the P. stanzas:

[indented to just past mid page] Faceless, I am what stands
As your wake, what wakes only to this moment
And knows nothing else. This soil is our covenant
And it collects everything: tithings of rain and snow,
Root scripts, the tatters of wedding gowns fruit trees throw
From their shoulders in spring . . .

In this collection there is sensuality, there is colour, there is allusion, there is history, there is guilt, there is emotion, there is sound play, there is attention, humility & syntactic strength, all amounting to passionate & intense poetry. When I am bemoaning the lacklusterism of my fellow humans, this is a book I can turn to, to remind me that somewhere a fire is still burning.

above/ground press broadside #309

2011-12-04T21:30:00.003-05:00

my untitled broadside, an homage to Phil Hall, now available from the lovely Ottawa press above/ground press
along with other broadsides & chapbooks. pick 'em up &/or subscribe to get all the wonders.

Ilk Journal: we are your kind

2011-12-01T07:00:00.003-05:00

i have a coupla vintage poems in this new on line journal from the UK here.

this was a few years back when i was reading quite a bit of Phyllis Webb. glad to see these finally out there. a few more of these were published in Pith & Wry and the site Sugarmule.

looking over that manuscript i see i have a bunch i haven't even sent out yet. now i'm flying a little closer to the ghazal (sun), working on a series of ghazals called Ghazals Against the Gradual Demise. we'll see what happens...

2011 Best of Lists: Music

2011-11-30T14:05:00.003-05:00

Kate Bush - 50 Words for Snow

This is a lush & beautiful album. Each song is at least six minutes long. It's a great combo of whimsy & depth with such songs as the title track, 50 Words for Snow, in which Stephen Fry lists words for snow in various languages. This is a contemplative album, perfect for the dark private spaces we all enter at this time of year. I have been a modest fan of Kate Bush, but this album shall make me return to her music. In her recent interview with Jian Ghomeshi on CBC's Q, I was pleased by how humble & unbothered she seemed by her fame, also I was fascinated to learn how much film & dance have been part of her videos. Did you know that Donald Sutherland was in one of her videos?

Sarah Slean - Land and Sea (Pheromone Records)

A double album with 18 songs, the first half "Land" was produced by Joel Plaskett. Another example of lush pop with beautiful string arrangements & Slean's incredible voice. I like Slean's intensity & sense of theatre in these songs.

My Morning Jacket - Circuital

Once again Jim James' sexy voice combined with the band's mellow accompaniment suits me. I have very little MMJ music, but love all that I own. It's a bit reminiscent of the prog rock of the 70s. I don't have my turntable, red curtains & rec room anymore, but this music sends me right back there. Apparently one of the tracks, "Wonderful the Way I Feel" was supposed to be on the Muppets soundtrack but didn't make it. duh.

Matthew Barber - Matthew Barber

I love this man's gorgeous low voice & he is sure easy on the eyes. I saw him live for the first time at the Ottawa International Writers Festival Fall Edition song writers' circle & i was blown away. (On a sidenote, the man is tall, oooh, so very tall.) Middle of a Dream is my favourite song on this album. Barber is extremely talented; he made this album by himself, including playing all the parts. Some lovely acoustic guitar here. I had heard Jill Barber a few times & loved her voice. Her brother is equally talented. Good genes obviously. I'd love to hear them sing together

Ron Sexsmith - Long Player Late Bloomer

Another beautiful album from Ron Sexsmith with memorable melodies that hark back to Motown Soul, in the case of No Help At All. What I always wish for any Sexsmith album is that producers would have a lighter hand. I have always liked Sexsmith live better than the album versions; however, that being said, I think Bob Rock did a good job on this album; it helped to be able to see what went on behind the scenes via the wonderful documentary Love Shines. Rock definitely contributed good ideas for the arrangements, particularly for the song "Love Shines." See also Ron's terrific short sleeve notes for this & earlier albums. I am still yearning for a live album some day. I also recommend the Massey Hall tribute as part of the Luminato 2011 festival, particularly the song "Wastin' Time," performed by his partner Colleen Hixenbaugh of By Divine Right. What a gorgeous voice she has. She & Ron should absolutely do some duets. I got to see Mr. Sexsmith twice this year when he played the First Baptist Church & made an in-store appearance at the CD Warehouse. my sweet, old-fashioned crush on this man remains in tact.

Andrea Simms-Karp - Hibernation Nation

(already said stuff about this great album & this great singer here)

Feist - Metals

I think this is a richer, deeper album than what I've heard from Feist so far. Apparently the album was inspired by the book " 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus" by Charles C. Mann about the Pre-Columbian Americas, & was recorded partially in Big Surr. There's something of a soundtrack quality to the album. Feist plays in Ottawa on December 5 at the NAC.

Okkervil River - Golden Opportunities II

Hey, the 2nd of OR's xmas freebie mixtapes of covers from their live albums & it's amazing. You can get it here. & You can get the first one by clicking on the Pitchfork link on the Wiki page.

Okkervil River - I am very far

This band has been prolific indeed. I didn't love this album at first, but it's growing on me. I guess I find the strong rhythm very different from the band's normal slow pace, at least in my recollection. It is growing on me though. It does feel like a very highly produced record compared to previous. & I don't feel like it highlights Will Shef's sexy low voice enough, damn it.

An album I don't have, but I'd like to get is Tom Waits Bad As Me. Have listened to a few of the tracks & enjoyed very much. He seems to be playing a bit of a cowboy with some lovely bright guitar & the goofy bad ass in this one. Not unusual for Mr. Waits, I suppose. Nice that his site has not just a few sample tracks but also the lyrics. I love this man for his song writing, pure poetry.

Speaking of good song writing, I'm also looking forward to Leonard Cohen's new CD, Old Ideas to be released in 2012.

I'm excited about by the Black Keys-El Camino soon to be released. You can hear some of the songs already on the band's site. I love Dan Auerbach's voice, the strong drum & sexy electric guitar. Hey is that a bit of surf guitar I hear on Lonely Boy? Groovy. They could use this album for Pulp Fiction 2.

What are your favs of 2011 & which forthcoming new releases are you looking forward to?

a shortish note on priorities

2011-11-28T15:11:00.003-05:00

at the end of the year, like many, i tend to pause & reflect on my priorities, goals etc. what has changed, i suppose, since my brush with the rim greeper is my intensity & my focus. i am able to easily brush off what doesn't matter & i have an inflamed sense of justice, not arrogant or acting as if i know all, i hope, but just intense, loyal, caring & stubborn as hell. not quite but almost fearless. i've had a very good year, am grateful for my health, for my dear & loving husband, for friends, for the ability to purse a non-conformist life of contemplation, exuberance, love, & whimsy. i am a misbehaving fish, that is to say unschooled...

1. MY LIFE WITH CHARLES

all things devoted to our physical, sexual, emotional & financial well-being, including our divine aerie perched high above downtown Ottawa within walking distance to everything good; Charles' strong coffee, amazing meals & baked goods, his photography, my guitars, myriad charmingly uneven clay pots of my own hand, books upon books, a powerful computer, the internet, the radio, an old tv with basic cable & a king-sized bed, & thankfully not including a mortgage, house repairs, debt, a car, car maintenance, jet-setting holidays, wall paper, an ensuite bathroom, fancy ceramic tiles or matching dishes.

2. DEAR FRIENDS

for a long time i have cherished kindred spirits & those who had time to spend with me & attention to give, but my health crisis two years ago showed me how giving & caring friends can actually be, whether they were sitting at my bedside in the hospital, buying groceries for Charles or driving him to the hospital, sending me cards, letters, books & assorted gifts to cheer me, these darlings have been exceptional. i care about them very much, shower them with attention, love & praise, small limited edition copies of chapbooks, music mixes, post cards & visits. these lovely people, & you know who you are, are my family. what i value most in a friend: loyalty, integrity, the ability to teach me something.

3. MY WRITING

i spend much time listening & observing what goes on around me; i read, watch films & tv, listen to music, follow the weather obsessively, visit pubs & cafes, knit, conduct in depth research on a subject, go to concerts on occasion, visit galleries & gardens--all this to stimulate the senses & keep the neurons firing. not as an afterthought, but more as a kind of organic & natural consequence, is the publication of said writing. i do want readers but it is more important for me to write & explore. when i do share my work with readers, i want them to be affected by it. i have a long way to go before this can happen. so far, i haven't really written any agenda-based work, & i'm pretty sure i won't do so. i despise it. i have been fortunate to receive the occasional support from the City of Ottawa & the Ontario Arts Council for which I am grateful, very grateful. such support helps with priority #1.

4. LITERARY OUTREACH

Thru Bywords it is my mission to promote, bolster & support Ottawa's literary community, both its writers & readers, & ensure that out-of-town writers wish to come to the city by giving them a very warm welcome & lots of promotion. Bywords is just one of a plethora of great initiatives started by caring Ottawa residents that debunk the tired old myth that we are a boring gov't town that rolls up its sidewalks at night.

Thru AngelHousePress, i publish, feature & highlight works of great merit that might go otherwise unnoticed. after i got sick, my priorities for AngelHousePress changed a wee bit, or rather they have slowed down. i am not interested in publishing a slew of chapbooks just because or conforming to some regular schedule, but rather the occasional work that thrills or compels or affects in some way. & while i love the tactile beauty & streak of independence the chapbook has to offer, i am also quite enamoured with the possibilities of the Internet for spreading good stuff around to those who want to experience it, & also for presenting said stuff in beautiful ways. & also for connecting kindreds. thanks to the talented & supportive Charles, i am able to do so.

5. COMMUNITY OUTREACH

i am so fortunate, i want to give back. if i had a bunch of money, i'd probably donate it all to the Ottawa General Hospital for saving my life as if their own life depended on it. also i am heart-broken & concerned for the homeless, for those who must go without food, for the war torn, for those who suffer domestic abuse, for the grieving. i look for ways i can offer something, sometimes alas it's just a poem.

Experiment-o.com issue four now on line

2011-11-27T09:45:00.002-05:00

AngelHousePress is pleased to announce the publication of the fourth issue of experiment-o.com, an annual pdf magazine that celebrates the art of risk.

this year's issue features poetry and visual poetry by Cameron Anstee, Caleb JW Brasset, Stephen Brockwell, Marco Giovenale, Mark Goldstein, Phil Hall, Marton Koppany, Ben Ladouceur, Joel Lipman & Francis Raven.

thank you to our first guest curator, Jamie Bradley & our designer & site guru, Charles Earl.

thank you to the contributors & thank you in advance for reading experiment-o.com.

Amanda Earl
http://angelhousepress.com/
the angel is in the house

Cover Songs: what are your faves?

2011-11-25T09:23:00.005-05:00

On Monday, November 28, on Between Thought and Expression on CKCUFM (11am-12:30pm), there will be a show devoted to cover songs. Ok. i love covers, love them. i find it interesting to hear a different interpretation of a song. it help me to understand the song better and the writer's original intention.

there's always some discussion about whether a cover is better than the original. for the most part i just enjoy that they are different. and think of Bob Dylan, who has constantly sang different versions of his own songs. is different better? different is just different & can reveal more about a song's architecture. On a recent interview on CBC Radio 3, Sondre Lerche said that if someone is just going to cover a song as it is originally, what's the point? i agree with that. i like to hear the difference to understand why the composer made certain choices in his/her arrangements, rhythm etc.

i have a big collection of covers. here are a few of my favs. what are yours?

Jeff Buckley: Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen) {i like other covers ok for this, but Buckley's version has packs a heavier emotional punch for me; the k.d. lang version is beautiful but too smooth for my liking}

Jeff Buckley/Nina Simone: Lilac Wine (James Shelton)

Nina Simone/David Bowie: Wild is the wind (Dimitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington)

the soundtrack of Bob Dylan's Masked and Anonymous especially Come Una Pietra Scalciata (Like A Rolling Stone) - Articolo 31 (Bob Dylan)

Ron Sexsmith: Heart with no companion (Leonard Cohen);
Ron Sexsmith: Good Old Desk & I Guess the Lord Must Be In New York City (Harry Nilson)

Ron Sexsmith: Everyday I Write The Book (Elvis Costello)

Ron Sexsmith: Drifter (Gordon Lightfoot)

Emmylou Harris: The Magdalene Laundries (Joni Mitchell) & the whole A Tribute to Joni Mitchell album)

Ramblin' Jack Elliott: Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues (Bob Dylan) & the whole I'm Not There soundtrack

Lucy Kaplansky: It Ain't Me Babe (Bob Dylan) & the whole A Nod to Bob album

Cake: Ruby don't take your love to town & the whole b-sides and rarities album

Beth Gibbons and Rustin' Man: Candy Says (Lou Reed)

Beth Orton: Sisters of Mercy (Leonard Cohen) & the whole LC: I'm Your Man album

Ana Egge: Wastin' Time (Ron Sexsmith)

Arlo Guthrie: Can't Help Falling In Love With You (Elvis Presley)

Dream Syndicate: Cinnamon Girl (Neil Young)

Annie Lennox: Thin Line Between Love and Hate (the Persuaders)

Annie Lennox: A Whiter Shade of Pale (Procal Harum)

Annie Lennox & also the Talking Heads: Take Me To the River (Al Green)

Big Star: Femme Fatale (The Velvet Underground)

the Bare Naked Ladies: Lovers in a dangerous time (Bruce Cockburn)

Tom Waits: Sea of Love (John Phillip Baptiste)

Joan Jett and the Blackhearts: Love is all around (the Mary Tyler Moore show opening song)

Clayhill: Please please please let me get what I want (the Smiths)

the Cowboy Junkies: Blue Moon (Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart)

Crosby, Stills and Nash: Everybody's Talkin' (Fred Neil)

Indigo Girls: Romeo and Juliet (Dire Straits)

Jimi Hendrix: All Along the Watchtower (Bob Dylan)

Bleecker Street: Greenwich Village In The 60's

Scala & Kolacny Brothers: Bittersweet Symphony (the Verve)

Luke Doucet, Lovecats (Robert Smith)

Adam Sandler, Werewolves of London & the whole Eat Every Sandwhich album (Warren Zevon)

Maggie Gyllenhaal: Just the way you are (Bruno Mars)

the Langley Schools Project: In my room (Brian Wilson and Gary Usher)

Susanna and the Magical Orchestra: Love will tear us apart (Joy Division)

Siouxie and the Banshees: Strange Fruit (Abel Meeropol)

Minnie Riperton and José Feliciano: Light my fire (the Doors)

Billy Brag: Walk Away Renée (Michael Brown)

Mott the Hoople: All the Young Dudes (David Bowie)

Joaquin Phoenix: Ring of Fire (Johnny Cash)

Harry Manx and Kevin Brett: I'm On Fire (Bruce Springsteen)

My Morning Jacket: Rocket Man (Elton John)

{& i am looking forward to Muppets: the Green Album coming out in August 2011 with a whole slew of covers by folks like Sondre Lerche, Andrew Bird etc}

Late Editions

Pearl Jam, All Along the Watchtower (Bob Dylan)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rYhbeXuIF8&list=PL99E24270EC828E36&index=1&feature=plpp_video

Stubbs the Zombie soundtrack with songs like If I Only Had A Brain from the Wizard of Oz by the Flaming Lips

Ottawans: where to spend money this xmas

2011-11-24T14:21:00.003-05:00

the Ottawa Food Bank is always looking for non perishable food items and money.

the Christmas Exchange makes it possible for low-income families to celebrate the holidays.

Cornerstone Housing for Women provides emergency shelter and support to Ottawa's downtown homeless women.

the Ottawa Mission is looking for donations of $2.97 to provide homeless persons with a meal at xmas.

the Snowsuit Fund needs money and knitted articles as well as gently used winter outerwear, hats, mits and boots of all sizes to keep children warm this winter.

these are just a few of the local charities that do good work all year round and should be supported all year round. winter and the holidays are particularly difficult times for many people, so a little extra care can't hurt.

the holidays are also difficult on those who have lost someone close and those who are alone. remember them. include them somehow in your festivities.

2011 Canadian Blog Awards

2011-11-22T20:56:00.002-05:00

some kind person (s) has (have) nominated this here blog for best culture & literature blog. i think there are finer ones, rob mclennan's, Pearl Pirie's Pesbo...but if you feel like exercising your right to vote and wish to vote for this here blog, that would be very cool. to my knowledge, it hasn't been nominated for any bests so far.

here's the link.

thanks in advance & sending virtual roses & bubbly yr way...

Andrea Simms-Karp Hibernation Nation CD Release

2011-11-21T13:16:00.004-05:00

On Saturday night, Charles and I had the pleasure of attending the Ottawa CD release night 2 of Hibernation Nation by Andrea Simms-Karp at the Gallery, Eclessiax Church in the Glebe.

If you don't have Hibernation Nation yet, you should pick up a copy pronto. The CD, as you can likely guess from the title, takes its inspiration from winter. It makes a nice compliment to Adam Gopnik's CBC Massey Lectures on Winter. Andrea's lyrics on the CD dwell on themes such as the isolation from living in a winter climate, winter as an external severe force we need to shelter from, melancholy resulting from a lack of light. There's something cheering about contemplating the severity of winter from inside one's warm abode whilst listening to this beautiful CD.

I love Andrea's music and have been a fan for a number of years. I can't remember if we first heard her somehow at Cafe Nostalgica or later, but i think it was in the early aughts that we first heard her and if not at the cafe, then thru a connection to someone who was a regular performer there. i was enchanted from the get by her clear high tones and lyrics and a kind of sassy don't take no bullshit attitude. ("You know me, I'm gonna work it" One Lane Highway)

As a side note, i want to say again how much I adore the fact that we have such a good music scene here in Ottawa. thank you Ottawa & area musical wonders for being so damn good. to work creatively in this town, i need to be surrounded by your good vibes & talent.

For some reason i didn't realize that Andrea has a band. I've only ever heard her perform alone. I had heard of her cousin Brian Simms before, but never had a chance to hear him perform live. He opened on Saturday night and I enjoyed his songs very much. I have one already from the fabulous Ottawa for Haiti CD, Old Tree, which he performed on Saturday night. Accompanying Brian was Adam Fogo, hella talented on an instrument that looked a bit like a cross between a bass & a cello. or a bass that he played with a bow. {research has identified the instrument as a viola da gamba, hurray!}

Andrea and her band, most excellent band, i might add (Brian Simms, Jeff Gleeson & Jack MacGregor), began with a knock-yer-socks-off rendition of the Bill Withers classic, Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone. The band was joined by Jerusha and Christine, two vocalists who go by the handle Double Edged Soul, and Andrea Harden, a violinist.

They were amazing and complemented Andrea's dulcet tones nicely (sorry about the dulcet tones, i'm running out words for great sounding. mellifluous isn't right, because Andrea's voice isn't full of honey or overly sweet, it's clear and high and warm, not brash sounding, but soft and light. damn my inarticulate tongue). Later the vocalists joined Andrea for Timoneer, such a heart-rending song. hard to pick favourites with such a fantastic CD, but i must say that i keep coming back to this song, its intensity, the grief. Andrea Harden also played on more songs. The violin was a perfect addition, adding a harmonic counterpoint to Andrea's voice.

The venue where the concert took place was quite nice, small but with excellent acoustics, hard wood floors, the added touch of xmas lights, and a homey feel. There were also baked goods and Italian soda. I should also say that Andrea looked sexy and resplendent in a yellow dress. The whole evening was resplendent and sexy (that drummer with the blue shirt and intense eyes, swoon, swoon...)

The evening ended with a standing ovation (of course), and an encore from Andrea's last CD, Sleeper with the song Silvering. "There's something about this neighbourhood..." Was lovely to hear that song live. And then we walked out into the imaginary snow.

Call & Response # 3: Monty Reid at SPAO

2011-11-18T08:26:00.002-05:00

So Is The Madness of Humans by Monty Reid in response to THE FARM FAMILY PROJECT by Rob Macinnis

Vernissage: Friday, November 18th, 2011, 18:00pm - 21:00pm
On View: November 18th, 2011 - December 17th, 2011

Read the poems here or at the gallery whilst ogling the pics.

Third in the C&R series curated by rob mclennan & co-ordinated by Khalia Scott of SPAO. responses so far by Pearl Pirie and YT (yours truly)

In 2012 responses forthcoming by Sandra Ridley, Christine McNair...

Collaborations between writers & artists are the bomb. wish there were more.

Rants: 1. Ogre Transpo 2. Day of Shame

2011-11-11T10:30:00.003-05:00

1. Ogre Transpo strikes again

i have called OC Transpo Ogre Transpo for years. the management never treats riders like customers, blames us for every problem associated with the bus, treats their drivers horribly and the latest in their nonsensical draconian antics is forbidding driver Yves Roy to sing on his bus.

apparently they received 12 complaints this year, and this after the man has been singing on his bus for 11 years. even our Mayor has weighed in, explaining that if we allowed Roy to sing, all mayhem would break loose on the bus. why even riders might bring on karaoke machines and break into song. goodness me. imagine the horror.

meanwhile buses are constantly late, missing and overcrowded, we have a ridiculous line of buses during evening commutes along Slater that you could walk across faster than you could ride. and guess what? we're even getting a fare increase. i think Ogre Transpo and Mayor Whatzit have their priorities screwed up. meanwhile we're supposed to be thinking of the environment, we're supposed to be saving money on gas, etc. ottawa is car city and this attitude isn't helping.

2. remembering war. yes, remember it and feel shame, shame that humans have ever had to involve themselves in the horrible task of killing and maiming and destroying. show graphic photos of legs cut off, hold funerals and wakes for the dead. grieve for your lost loved ones who fought and those who are still fighting. don't march, don't wear uniforms and don't show photos of your grandma in her wwii uniform smiling away. the fact that people are still dying from war today makes me feel guilty and ashamed for being human. there's nothing to be proud of. i hate living in a city where people wear red on fridays to support the troops. is war sometimes necessary? i hate to say it but sometimes it has been necessary. this is not something to celebrate or to glorify. this should be a day where we all hang our heads in sorrow.

"Perhaps, when we remember wars, we should take off our clothes and paint ourselves blue and go on all fours all day long and grunt like pigs. That would surely be more appropriate than noble oratory and shows of flags and well-oiled guns."
Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut

2011 Erasure Poetry Contest Short List Announced

2011-11-11T09:09:00.000-05:00

After months of careful consideration and many late nights spent reading (and re-reading) more than 250 submissions, Geist is pleased to announce the short list for the 2011 Erasure Poetry Contest. Congratulations to the short-listed entrants!

•Janet Baker, "A week passed--"
•Maxianne Berger, Wabi-Sabi
•Amanda Earl, "Carly grew fried..."
•Joy Hamilton, Daydreaming
•Sam Helmer, A Family Gathering
•Renae Keep, ape
•Patty Milligan, Uncouth
•Kathryn Mockler, Companion
•Raymond Nakamura, Had Me At
•Karen Press, My Word

The three winners will be announced in Geist 83, our winter issue, out in January 2012.

Honourable mentions and the remaining short-listed poems will be available to read at geist.com in January 2012.

Fairest of the fair: bounty from the fall Ottawa Small Press Book Fair

2011-11-09T10:40:00.003-05:00

disclaimer: not reviews or anything of the kind, just wee ramblings about what i obtained at the fair. why bother writing up such? because i like to remember & because i want those of you who opted not to come to the fair get a taste of what you missed. so you'll come next time. because it's fun & profitable (if books are profits & small press publishers are prophets, i am a prophet ear)

above/ground press

Ken Norris - Looking In To It (part of my subscription; you should get one too)

Lesley Trites - echo mimic (Snare Books, 2011)

gifted by rob mclennan during pre-fair reading. excited to read Snare Books titles but what gremlins bedevilled their design & layout this year? tiny font, poems in the crack. egad.

Christian McPherson, the Cube People (Nightwood Editions, Gibson, BC, 2010)

at the Writers Festival this fall, Chris read an ejaculation scene from the above book. sometimes that's all it takes for me to purchase a title.

Coach House Books, Toronto, Ontario

with great deals: fiction -$15 and for some reason $13 for poetry. apparently poetry costs less to print. harumph as a poetry writer and huzzah as a reader.

Cordelia Strube - Lemon (2009)

have been meaning to pick this up for ages. the CHB table had credit card option for purchase. once again, huzzah.

Jones - the Brave Never Write Poetry (first edition 1985, second edition 2011)
a poet i've been meaning to read for ages. the rerelease gives me (& you) the opportunity.

the Emergency Response Unit, Toronto, Ontario

Nicholas Lea - Actual Girl

picked up at the pre-fair reading after hearing Nick read from it and Everything is Movies (Chaudiere Books, 2007)

long an admirer of Lea's spare poetry, am very glad to see new work from him once more.

also an admirer of TERU (if that's how they go by); Andrew Faulkner & Leigh Nash were both selectors for Bywords for a bit. yep, small world, ain't it.

In/Words & the Moose and Pussy joint things

broadsides from the freebie table:

Bardia Sinaee - Clearing Up the Question of It's Doing By Us

having never read any of Sinaee's poetry before, i was interested to read this poem. on the surface a very logical and straight-forward accumulation piece that begins with a quote from the world of the law. lots going on beneath the surface. the tension of sexual politics, the tension of sex. a slow burn. an intense poem. i look forward to more.

Jeremy Behreandt - A Poem About Shauna

i like the way this poem builds. another accumulation juxtaposing unlike objects & concepts. satisfying moments of lyricism & imagery. particularly enjoyed the close.

Odourless Press

3 chapbooks (one pagers) for a dollar-poems tucked away in envelopes & match holders

Bardia Sinaee - Royal Jelly

more logic play, exceptional lyricism & imagery, a fine imagination, some killer openings & closings. more, please.

Jeff Blackman - Back to My Old Self

understated comedic moments. articulate phrasing.

Ben Ladouceur - Five Poems

always a joy to read Ladouceur. young, fresh, sexual, thoughtful & often refreshingly inappropriate. something the In/Words gang does well. once more huzzah...

by the way, Cameron Anstee writes more intelligently about these new chapbooks over at the Ottawa Poetry Newsletter blog here.

& Bardia Sinaee is the perpetrator of the press, quiet for years to us outsiders, as far as i know, he now is a Literary Landscaper, hosting the CKCU show every 4th Thursday & has started this press. what next?

Phafours

In Air/ Air Out: 21 Poets for the Guatemala Stove Project, edited by Pearl Pirie
an example of a beautiful & well-thought-out design. this is my contributor copy. lots of folk in here i've never heard of. great to discover writers previously unknown to me. that's what the small fair's all about. pleased to see some favourites, such as Monty Reid, whose first line from 11. Denver - Mexico City "All air is hard air." & the rest of the poem. short & to the point. love Reid's matter-of-fact style that leads somehow to big beauty & majesty. moments of lyricism in rob mclennan's Air: a ( ) value & a damn fine epigraph by Paul Celan too. love that this anthology is all about air & the breath, something i've struggled with & still do, not just in the poetic line, but in my now healthy lungs. the poems in their various styles and voices all seem to flow well together. the sign of a good editor.

Pearl Pirie, Thirsts (Snare Books, 2011)

see note earlier about design gremlins. i always enjoy Pirie's work. she disrupts, disturbs, plays & brings together quiet moments. i shall trot out the magnifying glass & try to read this one. eeek. & by the way, can't get these Snare Book titles in any local bookstore. like much of what is on offer at these fairs.

Pearl Pirie, Mammals of Hoarfrost (Corrupt Press, France, 2011)

love the cover of hands in the shape of a flower, reaching out. in my soon to read pile.

Room 302 Books / 1 cent

& speaking of jwcurry, have you seen this flickr photostream of found photos, graffitti & other renegade miscellany?

Cellular Pain, In Tents # 3, Industrial Sabotage #19: Lorris Essary, Randall Brock, jwcurry/Mark Laba (& CURVD H&Z 87 of 100, 25'oct'1983)

Judith Copithorne - Brackets & Boundaries {Concrete & Other Accretions} (Returning Press, Vancouver, BC, 2011) - why i don't have everything Copithorne has ever done, i don't know. i collect it when i see it, & can afford. some of the pieces are reminiscent of those that appeared recently in 17 seconds. intricate tangled and twirled shapes and letters plus lingual comments. the multitude of As might be a demonstration of "the love of beginnings, mornings, the unexpected, a possibility of somewhat unencumbered perceptions &/or actions."

Gustave Morin - A Penny Dreadful (Insomniac Press, 2003)

pulped by Insomniac Press. ! glad to get my hands on this copy. book is thick with renegade works of a genius. when Morin came to Ottawa recently for the A B Series, he gave a talk on his concrete poetry that was one of the most interesting happenings to occur in Ottawa since jwcurry's marathon reading of bpNichol's the Martyrology at the Gazebo on the Hill. glorious sunsets & fireworks going off. Morin's works are works of art that question conformity & piss off conformists.

notes from a cartywheel now available from AngelHousePress

2011-11-05T08:01:00.003-04:00

a commonplace book is essentially a scrapbook "filled with items of every kind: medical recipes, quotes, letters, poems, tables of weights and measures, proverbs, prayers, legal formulas. Commonplaces were used by readers, writers, students, and humanists as an aid for remembering useful concepts or facts they had learned. Each commonplace book was unique to its creator's particular interests."

the Italian variety, Zibaldone, an astonishing variety of poetic and prose texts."[3] Devotional, technical, documentary and literary texts appear side-by-side in no discernible order." commonplacers included Dante Alighieri, John Milton, Mark Twain, Francis Bacon... [cadged from Wikipedia]

Christine McNair's notes from a cartywheel is full of poems, fragments, incantatory delights with a dark edge, piceous pit shadows, turquoise ballerinas, unlaced violins, bad dreams & lost maps. the chapbook is printed on distressed & glossy paper in a limited edition of 50 copies. my policy is that i do not do reprints, so once the 50 are gone, they're gone.

i am very pleased to publish notes from a cartywheel & hope that readers will enjoy it as much as i do. thanks to Christine McNair for her brilliant and resonant writing. thanks to Charles Earl for his brilliant and resonant design.

you can pick up a copy of the chapbook today, along with other AngelHousePress titles at the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair or on the AngelHousePress site via paypal or if you don't have access to paypal, we can make other arrangements. e-mail me at amanda at angelhousepress dot com

Air Out / In Air: 21 Poets for the Guatemala Stove Project

2011-11-04T04:40:00.004-04:00

is a new chapbook in which a hybrid vis-po/po of mine appears along with work by Allison Armstrong, Shai Ben-Shalom, Jeremy Colangelo, Dawn Corrigan, Czandra, James DeMers,Phil Hall, Rick Kempa, Adrienne Mercer, rob mclennan, Rhonda Melanson, Mike Montreuil, My Name Is Scot, Monty Reid, Nedjo Rogers, Jade Scapillato, Kevin Spenst, Luminita Suse, Danielle Susi, and Robert Swereda. Edited by Pearl Pirie. Cover art by James DeMers.

the chapbook was published by phafours, the small press of Pearl Pirie. all proceeds go to the Guatemala Stove Project.

Pearl will have copies available at the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair this Saturday and they are also available here, while supplies last.

this small, new intangible something

2011-11-02T14:45:00.003-04:00

is a wee chapbook i made for my 48th birthday on October 15, 2011. here are a few kind words on such by rob mclennan as part of his early november notes, in which he talks about chapbooks he has received of late.

i have a few copies of "this small, new intangible thing" left. i made 48. if you find yourself at the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair on November 5, stop by the AngelHousePress/Bywords.ca table and i'll gift you with one. still celebrating my birthday(s)...

Bywords Quarterly Journal Fall Launch

2011-10-28T21:25:00.005-04:00

Sunday, November 6, 2011, 2pm
Collected Works, 1242 Wellington St. W.
with poetry by Daniel Boland, Brigette de Pape, Ryan Pratt, Carol A. Stephen & Jean Van Loon, and music by Marie-Josée Houle

we will also be at the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair on Saturday, November 5, 2011.

ALSO the pre-fair reading takes place on November 4 at 7:00pm at the Carleton Tavern. featuring former Bywords selector Nicholas Lea, Bywords published poet Leo Brent Robillard and Lillian Necakov from Toronto.

the first weekend of November is a literary hotbed. hope to see you at all of these, dear Ottawans.

Support Community Radio

2011-10-28T08:07:00.002-04:00

Enthusiasts of the written and spoken word, here are some of the shows that i know of that have such content on CKCU FM & CHUO FM:

CKCU FM 93.1

Monday Special Blend with Dean Verger, 7am Mondays

Third World Players, 6pm Thursdays

Literary Landscape with alternating hosts Kathryn Hunt, Christine McNair, Bardia Sinae, and Neil Wilson, 6:30pm Thursdays (i still remember with great fondness Jane Crosier who started Literary Landscapes and hosted it for many years before her death a few years ago)

Friday Special Blend with Susan Johnston, 7am Fridays

on CHUO FM 89.1

Monday Night Scribes with John Akpata, 10pm Wednesdays

Click Here with Mitchell Caplan, 5pm Wednesdays

Not to mention great music, especially by independents, interviews about what's going on in Ottawa and the wide world from theatre, visual art, dance, music, sports, politics, the environment, economy.

The CKCU fund raising drive is happening now. If you want to help keep the shows alive, please call 613-520-3920 or go to www.ckcufm.com and click on "secure online pledge" to donate.

For CHUO go here: http://chuo.fm/about-chuo/support/

Literary events and writers have always received a lot of promotion and support from community radio. Now's the time to give back. Thanks to all who host the shows and help make community radio come to life.

CanLit humour

2011-10-24T15:54:00.003-04:00

the theme of today's noon session at the Ottawa International Writers Festival was "Is it hard to be funny?" with readings by Miriam Toews and Christian McPherson, with a discussion moderated by Citizen columnist Peter Simpson.

Miriam read another excerpt from her latest novel, Irma Voth (which she also read from last night), and Chris read from his first novel, the Cube People. it was a pleasure to hear both of them read. Peter talked about the different type of humour in their works, Irma Voth has humour tinged with sadness, whereas the Cube People & Chris' poetry tend to be exaggerated, reductio ad absurdum slices of life that take on a surreal quality.

Peter began with a joke to show that we all react differently to humour & then a quote from a recently deceased Canadian writer/critic named Eric Nichols (sp?) (i could have misheard, can't find any mention of such online). the quote described humour writing as a low calling. i think i understand what this meant. when writers use humour in their work, it is often seen as low brow, which is odd considering that humourous, ribald & bawdy writing has a long tradition. think of Rabelais, for example. humour has always been a way to critique the status quo, societal convention & those in power.

naturally both Chris & Miriam disagreed with the characterization of humour writing as a low calling. for both of them it seemed that rather than deliberately trying to write humourously, the humour naturally happened. Chris was a class clown as a child, Miriam finds humour necessary when faced with trying times.

Chris read the opening passage from his book. the passage was about the husband in a couple who are undergoing fertility treatment, the man at the clinic, trying to masturbate with all kinds of thoughts running through his mind. humour is used to broach an awkward topic, to cope with some of the absurd and difficult realities of living.

when i think of the word comedy, i think of the multiple meanings, of humour but also of day to day lives, of Balzac's la Comédie humaine, Italian's Commedia dell Arte,Dante's la Divina Commedia, the word comedy being used to describe the day-to-day lives of civilization or the theatre of the everyday or travels from one state to another...

both authors were asked once again, i believe by members of the audience, about the autobiographical connection to their fiction. this subject comes up a lot with audiences. i'm not quite sure why it is so important for readers to find an autobiographical connection. i am content to read literature as made up with universal truths being pointed out or questioned. in the case of both Miriam and Chris, real life certainly factored in to their writing, but doesn't it always?

last night David McGimpsey & Rob Benvie read and performed and there was much humour in their work, especially David's. yet i can't help mulling over the lack of attention to works with a comedic bent. one of my favourite poetry collections, Stuart Ross's Hey Crumbling Balcony: Poems New and Selected (ECW Press, 2003) for example or Gary Barwin's writing, full of humour, Alice Burdick's Flutter (Mansfield Press, 2008)--. and of course, the brilliant and humourous word-play of the late and dearly missed John Lavery. award worthy writing.

humour is a literary device that can be used to surprise readers, to turn them away from the expected. in various guises, it can offer a new way of thinking about something--a contrast with its conventional sense, a parody, or a societal critique. in these absurd times, we need humour now more than ever.

my own taste tends to run very much toward dry wit, found in the work of such writers as the late Roberston Davies, or howling puns. Peter Simpson gave the example of Mordichai Richler in Barney's Version. he cited a passage where a man who is dying of a heart-attack calls an emergency number and is asked to choose 1 for French & 2 for English, then he gets put on hold and has to listen to Mozart's Requiem Mass.

the event was engaging and has inspired much thought about humour and its role in CanLit. this is one of the reasons why i enjoy the Writers Festival, it inspires thought & more reading, writing, discussion...

i'd be curious to know about your favourite humourous poetry & fiction by current living Canadian writers, so if you can think of any, let me know.

Bywords 2011 John Newlove Poetry Award

2011-10-23T13:00:00.003-04:00

Congratulations to the winner & honourable mentions. All the info is here.

Group photo by Charles Earl
Benjamin Lancaster (honourable mention); Winter Fedyk (last year's award winner); Jesse Rose (performer); Amanda Earl (troublemaker); rob mclennan (award recipient)

Bywords 2011 John Newlove Poetry Award

2011-10-20T14:45:00.002-04:00

Ottawans, please join me on Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 8:30pm at the Knox Presbytarian Church, 120 Lisgar St (at Elgin). This is our 8th annual celebration of the poetry of John Newlove, a Prairie poet who lived for the last 17 years of his life in Ottawa.

We will launch Beneath Black Surface, the chapbook of last year's winner Winter Fedyk. We will announce the names of the recipient of this year's award and the honourable mentions. The judge this year was a. rawlings. There will be a reading by the winner and the honourable mentions and music by Jesse Rose on her six string baritone acoustic guitar.

The readers will also read selections from John Newlove's poetry. This is an opportunity to remember and celebrate one of Canada's greatest poets.

Winter's chapbook will be available at the Festival store on site, at the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair on November 5, 2011, and at the Bywords.ca store.

Please come enjoy the music, poetry, a cash bar & surprises! This is a free event.

Thank you to the Ottawa International Writers Festival for their ongoing support of the John Newlove Poetry Award and of Bywords.ca and the Bywords Quarterly Journal.

the Prose-Poem Project features excerpts from All the Catharines

2011-10-15T12:03:00.002-04:00

the Prose-Poem Project is an online and print literary journal devoted entirely to the prose poem. i am enamoured with the form and have been playing around with it now for the last three or four years, not exclusively but often.

All the Catharines is a work in progress for which I have received funding from the Ontario Arts Council's Writers' Reserve grant via Arc Poetry Magazine and Descant in 2010. It is made up of prose poems, free verse, sonnets, couplets and so forth. I still have much work to do on the manuscript. Here are a few excerpts in the Prose-Poem Project.

birthdy poem

2011-10-15T00:00:00.001-04:00

[click to enlarge]

& birthday play list is here

Writers Fest- a few picks from a reader & music geek

2011-09-30T13:41:00.003-04:00

Ottawa International Writers Festival Fall Edition
October 20-25, 2011

i count on the festival to introduce me to writers i haven't heard of. i have noticed over the years that i have discovered many of the novels and short story collections i've read through attendance at the festival. here are a few of the authors & works i'm looking forward to discovering at this fest & of course i expect to discover other serendipitous surprises.

OCTOBER 20-AN EVER PRESENT PAST with Frances Itani, Carmen Rodriquez and Anita Rau Badami, Knox Church, 6:30pm

i read an article in the Ottawa Citizen recently which talked about the winter setting of Anita Rau Badami's "Tell it to the Trees" and the author's own lack of affinity for the season. i think there is so much that can be done with a winter setting. (speaking of winter, i would love to read Adam Gopnik's Massey Lecture: "Winter: Five Shadows on the Season" which gives an overview of how winter has been treated by artists and writers.)

i like reading about experiences of immigrants in Canada, especially East Indians. The book sounds like its fraught with a lot of family tension, which is always fun. The trailer is here, for those that like trailers.

OCTOBER 21

SONGWRITING CIRCLE with Emm Gryner, Mathew Barber, Ann Vriend and Louise Burns, curated by the friendly Alan Neal of CBC's Ottawa Today and other shows. 8:30pm Knox Presbyterian Church. Emm Gryner!

RE-LIT AWARDS, 9:30pm Arc Lounge

i don't know if i'll make it there on time, but i am very happy to see that Glenn Nuotio will be performing in a celebration to John Lavery. i may have to break my rules and go anway, even if i'm late. also free books. i like free books. so who will win? well, here are my picks, not really guesses, but ...

NOVEL

Krakow Melt, Daniel Allen Cox (Arsenal Pulp)
(which i still haven't read! but i loved Shuck and i adore Daniel)

SHORT FICTIONI’m a Registered Nurse Not a Whore, Anne Perdue (Insomniac)

(again i haven't read this one and there are other amazing contenders here. love, love everything Ivan E. Coyote does, but i read a review of Perdue's book in Front&Centre by Matthew Firth and it sounded like a punch, no holes barred read.)

POETRY

The Inquisition Years, Jen Currin (Coach House)
(heard Jen read from this book at an A B Series event and it's the only one i've read on the list, i'm ashamed to admit)

OCTOBER 22

POETRY CABARET with Dionne Brand and Patrick Lane-hosted by the brilliant and talented Stephen Brockwell-4PM, Knox Presbyterian Church;

THE CHAIRS ARE WHERE THE PEOPLE GO with Sheila Heiti and Misha Glouberman, the Manx, 5pm; i will be sad to miss this event, you should defintely go. the book sounds unusual and quirky, worth a read.

BYWORDS JOHN NEWLOVE POETRY AWARD, 8:30 pm Knox Presbyterian Church (of course, this is one of my pics);
great music and wonderful readings by last year's recipient of the award Winter Fedyk and this year's honourable mentions and winner. it's a celebration of a year's worth of Bywords' poetry. and i will make a special announcement about next year's judge too. the evening will be full of surprises. and a cash bar!

and if i can manage to stay up, Ukrainia! 9:30pm Arc Lounge

OCTOBER 23

PLAN 99 with Jennifer Still, Nick Thran and Sandra Ridley, the Manx Pub, 5pm
very much looking forward to hearing Sandra read from her new book Post-Apothecary

6:30pm HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE with Johanna Skibsrud, Helen Oyemi and Miriam Toews-hosted by the charming and skilled writer Michael Blouin, Knox Presbyterian Church

Helen is the only one of these three who i've ever heard read before at the festival, and i enjoyed her reading immensely at the time; i look forward to all three and i am fond of the theme, taken from a Sartre quote. All their books are on my wishlist. i haven't yet read Miriam Toews and Irma Voth sounds very captivating. I haven't heard much yet about Helen's Mr. Fox at all, but the blurb on the fest site is good. i have read & enjoyed some of Johanna's poetry, "Late Nights with Wild Cowboys" (Gaspereau Press, 2008) and am interested to see what she will do with short fiction in "This will be difficult to explain and other stories."

9:30pm MUSICAL LANGUAGE:SPOTLIGHT ON COACH HOUSE BOOKS with Rob Benvie and David McGimpsey, Arc Lounge

another late night event, which i am aiming to attend, but not making any promises. haven't ever heard of Benvie, but just took a look at his site, and saw he was a member of the band, the Dears, which i do sort of remember. so i have no idear (groan!). he's also one of the features at Coach House's fiction event on Monday, October 3 at Mother Tongue Books. (check the bywords.ca calendar, do i even need to say it?)

David McGimpsey is an Ottawa favourite. i enjoy his wry wit and self-deprecation. there's not enough self-deprecation in Canadian lit either. i also enjoy the photos of greasy food from American diners he posts on FaceBook. L'il Bastard is his fifth collection of poems.

OCTOBER 24
IS IT HARD TO BE FUNNY with Christian McPherson and Miriam Toews at the Ottawa Public Library, Main Branch, noon, hosted by provocative Citizen columnist and blogger Peter Simpson. i am a fan of Chris's poetry and will be happy to see how he engages with Miriam and to see the different styles of their humour. there's not enough humour in Canadian literature, alas.

OCTOBER 25
LOVE OF MY LIFE with David Gilmour, Kevin Chong and Anne Enright, 8:30pm Knox Presbyterian Church
i love it when David Gilmour comes to the festival. the man is charmingly provocative or provocatively charming. his book "the Film Club" was unputdownable. David hasn't been shy about mixing a lot of real life in his fiction. here's a review of his latest novel, the Perfect Order of Things. i do so enjoy the picaresque. i also am interested in the hybrid of memoir and fiction, the remixing of work from previous books into this book. i find it an inspiring possibility for poetry too (am conjuring up a new poetry project as i type this...)

i think the festival has done a good job programming a variety of cultural and literary events that will be of interest to Ottawans. and their pre-fest events are happening now. check the site for more info. become a member. hope to see you there.

A Whack of Rants

2011-09-28T08:20:00.002-04:00

Been a while since i did a rant, so here are three.

RANT 1: Artists & Money

On FaceBook recently a silly poster has been shared all over the place saying "I'm an artist, don't expect me to work for free." While I think it's great when artists get paid for their work, I do expect them to work on their stuff because they are exploring and testing boundaries etc., etc. That's why I think this statement is nonsense. An artist is going to explore their art regardless of receiving money for it or not.

Being paid for the end result of one's art is another issue. Writers, visual artists, dancers, musicians, playwrights etc who attempt to live off the money they earn as artists, except for rare examples, often live below the poverty line. They have chosen art over practical concerns. I wish we lived in a society where all artists could get funded for working on their art, but we don't. We live in a society where art is seen as a hobby by many people, is funded barely by the powers that be, even though it has been proven what an economic benefit art is. Many artists who are famous now were not rewarded financially for their work in their life time. I'm not saying that artists should starve for their art. I'm just saying that yeah, artist, I expect that you will do your art without financial remuneration, but I hope that you get paid for it.

Part 2 of this rant is about the be all end all obsession with money

There are all kinds of ways to get paid for one's work. Artists may exchange their creative output for attention. Most artists dwell in obscurity most of their lives. To have one's work paid attention to is rare and important. In this day and age of social media and blogs and sites, artists might exchange creative output for a chance to have their work shown on a popular site. They are exchanging creativity for publicity. It's a fair exchange. Sharing one's creative output for free also can help discover other artists working in a similar field. The exchange of creativity for creativity is a fair and wonderful exchange. Not to mention trading one's work for other people's.

Everyone dreams of being a famous novelist with scads of money and adoring fans, but the truth is that happens rarely. Someone said once "if you don't have to write, don't." and i think that applies to all artistic disciplines: if you aren't driven to do it to explore on an artistic level, then don't. For the most part your ego is going to be bruised, your wallet will be empty and nobody will give a rat's ass about your art. You are the one who has to care.

RANT 2: Question and Answer sessions

I go to a lot of readings etc. And inevitably there's one person during a Q&A who will stand up, not ask a question but ramble on with praise for the author and then launch into some lengthy personal diatribe, wasting everyone's time and monopolizing the mic. I don't get it. Why do people do that? I'm sorry but nobody, including the writer, cares. It's just not the time. I don't know how organizers are supposed to react to this. It's rude and self absorbed and selfish.

RANT 3: Buy local

So recently I had to listen to a well known celebrity chef rant on and on about the buy local movement. His rant ruined the evening for me. Not because he didn't make some good points but because it was not what i expected when i decided to spend a precious evening attending what i thought would be a discussion on his recipes, stories about his experiences and tips on making meals. The guy was so absolutist. Meanwhile I took a look at all his clothes, his shoes, his fancy silver ring etc, and wondered if all of them were products he bought locally. Meanwhile I listened to him talk about his wonderful and expensive hobbies. Meanwhile I heard him say that a gadget he can't live without is his pepper mill because he loves ground pepper. I wondered where in his little hamlet he bought locally grown pepper. Or the Thai curry paste in his recipe book, or the cumin. I don't enjoy hypocrisy and I hate being lectured to.

The whole buy local issue is not so straight-forward. Firstly instead of lobbying to get nutritious and flavourful food into the grocery stores where Canadians who are not wealthy kite flyers who guzzle ice wine syrup but average families with earnings that barely cover their mortgages, this fellow and many of the buy local proponents advocate stopping in to wee shops where you know the butcher, the baker and the candle stick maker. For most of us living in urban centres this would entail wandering off to the far reaches of some little town, using up plenty of gas and then spending double or triple the going rate for a block of cheese or a chicken. Where's the concern for the carbon footprint taken up in pursuit of such? Where's the concern for the whole world rather than one's little berg and what such protectionist, isolationist embargos do for the global economy?

Don't get me wrong I understand that AgriBusiness is fucked up, that the food distribution system is fucked up. But instead of working with the system and lobbying for the availability and affordability of good nutritious food for all, the buy local movement and this fellow in particular seem to be advocating another enclave for the rich to shelter in while the poor continue to eat their kraft dinner because it's a hell of a lot cheaper to buy in a grocery store than a bunch of produce. This reminds me of the rich wanting Canada to adapt a private health care system instead of having universal health care. It's wrong-headed and elitist and selfish.

Michèle Provost : Vocabulaire

2011-09-26T09:49:00.003-04:00

[i have a wee piece in this show as one of several people invited to write something using any or all of 100 words that Michèle found in the local urban environment.]

Michèle is a creative kindred spirit who i admire for her eclectic flexibility and imagination. Here's a quote about her work taken from her bio for an artists' talk at the Ottawa Art Gallery in 2003:

"Michèle Provost's work involves the subjective assessment of the world that surrounds her. It evokes the fleeting and the mundane, the little moments and simple thoughts that often get lost in an otherwise overpowering and frantic life."

Espacémi, the art gallery of UQO (Université du Québec en Outaouais), is proud to present Vocabulaire, a new exhibition by artist Michèle Provost. The exhibition is featured as part of les Journées de la culture en Outaouais.

Here's the info from the invitation:

"Vocabulaire is an attempt to extract a bit of poetry out of the everyday, by isolating some text elements that have become so customary that our eyes no longer bother conveying them to our brains. The work is centered around a list of 100 French words collected and photographed during regular comings and goings on both sides of the Ottawa River. The installation also features special contributions from a wide variety of both French and English participants, who will individually explore and recompose the same collection of ambient vocabulary. The aim of the exercise is to explore how such apparently banal utterances can be recombined and reconfigured to form an infinite number of more substantial concepts and images."

The exhibition will be on view from September 30 to October 13 2011, at the gallery of the Université du Québec en Outaouais (UQO).

Opening hours :
Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, 12 to 2PM and 6 to 7 PM
Saturday, 1 to 4 PM
Pavillon Lucien-Brault (A-0112), 101 rue Saint-Jean-Bosco, Gatineau

Hope to see you at the vernissage on Friday, September 30 between 5 and 8pm.

Call and Response 2

2011-09-22T17:28:00.001-04:00

info and poem excerpts on the SPAO site

SPAO Show Teasers

2011-09-22T07:43:00.003-04:00

When I was a child, I believed that if I squinted just so or held myself very still, I would see the angels and ghosts that hovered just beyond the corners of my eyes.

[Click on image to read text]

Vernissage: Friday, September 23, 2011 6-9pm, SPAO 168 Dalhousie
Show continues til October 29, 2011

Poems in the Moment

2011-09-19T09:19:00.004-04:00

I am honoured to have been invited by rob mclennan to participate in "Call and Response: Poetic Responses to Photographs in the Red Wall Gallery," School of Photographic Arts Ottawa (SPAO). For this project, I had the utmost pleasure of responding to Moment(o) Mexico at a glance (un vistazo) by John Hewett Hallum, who very kindly discussed his work with me.

From September 23 to October 29, 2011, if you go to the gallery, you will see John's wonderful photos of Mexico on the wall and you will be able to read my series "In the Tempo of Now: a poetic accompaniement to Moment(o)." I hope you will have a chance to visit. SPAO is located at 168 Dalhousie St, fairly far north.

I inially wrote a fairly long statement for the project, but didn't want to bog down gallery viewers with it. To me, the photos demanded sparseness not wordiness. But this is the web and you have a bit more time to read, if interested, so I thought I'd include my revised statement below.

At some point there may be some online content that I can share with you and if so, I'll add. The call and response project is a collaboration between SPAO and the local poetry community and is curated by rob mclennan, whose praises i can't sing highly enough. once more he has encouraged us fraidy cat poets to stretch our paws a wee bit.

here's some well-deserved acknowledgments, the statement and a bibliography:

Acknowledgements

Thanks to rob mclennan for including me & for encouraging me to push beyond.

A special thanks to John Hewett Hallum for his friendliness, co-operation and assistance.

To the University of Ottawa library and the Ottawa Public Library which made it possible for me to find resources not easily available on line.

Statement

In her excellent response to Leslie Hossack's Cities of Stone - People of Dust, Pearl Pirie takes on the role of poet-journalist. Here, in a very different context, I am not a journalist; I am a fabricator whose imagination has been sparked by John Hewett Hallum's impressionistic photographs of Mexico...from the corner of his eye to my mind's eye.

In mathematics there is something called "interpolation," which is to construct new points between known points. There is also "extrapolation," which is to extend or expand experience into the unknown. This is how I worked with John's photos. I listened to the tone and the mood that the work evoked, to what was around.

In my practice and in life in general, I am a magpie. I pick up shiny objects. I keep what resonates. For this project, I read about Mexico's rich literary and cultural history. I enthusiastically dove into articles about Mescal, chapolines, which are grasshoppers served as snacks, the conquest of Mexico by the Spanish, magic realism, ghost stories and legends.

I read the contemporary poets of Mexico and their influences, including Octavio Paz. Through his writing, I discovered Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, a 17th century poet and brilliant scholar from Oaxaca. "Hear me one moment/I'm all set to sing!," she wrote in 1689.

Digging a bit further into Mexican literature, I took a detour into the Pre-Columbian era where I made the acquaintance of Nezahualcoyotl, the Hungry Coyote, a 13th century ruler and the Poet King of Texcoco. Much of his poetry focused on the moment. " Not forever on earth, only a brief time here!" The Flower Tree.

With his photographs, John offers us a gift: a moving landscape that changes moment by moment, eroded by time, weather and water, so that even if we visit the same places, we will never see the same images again.

To complement these photographs, I offer you poems that juxtapose the fleeting moment with the eternal, fantasy with reality. Quotes from Mexican literature are in italics within the poems. This literature, along with Mexico's art and history, shape the architecture and the landscape of the country. These poems, have been inspired both by the literature and by John's poignant and compelling photographs.

My goal here is not to impose meaning or understanding but to unleash your imagination.

The river goes by, goes by
and never stops.
The wind goes by, goes by
and never stops.

Life goes by
and never comes back.

from Four Otomi Poems, p. 119 Flower and song : poems of the Aztec peoples

Bibliography

A Sor Juana Anthology, Translated by Alan S. Trueblood, with a foreword by Octavio Paz, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England, 1988.

Sor Juana, Or, The Traps of Faith, Octavio Paz, Translated by Margaret Sayers Peden, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1988.

The Collected Poems of Octavio Paz, Edited and Translated by Eliot Weinberger, New Directions, New York, 1987.

Flower and song : poems of the Aztec peoples, Translated and Introduced by Edward Kissam and Michael Schmidt, Anvil Press Poetry, Neptune House, London, 2nd Edition 2009.

The Flower Songs of Nezahualcoyotl

THE BOOK OF CHILAM BALAM OF CHUMAYEL

Where the Air is Clear, Carlos Fuentes, Translated by Sam Hileman, Ivan Obolensky, Inc., New York, 1960.

Ignacio Padilla: Latin American writers grew iguanas to make them look like dinosaurs, The Independent, July 20, 2002.

Move Over, Tequila, It’s Mescal’s Turn to Shine, Randal C. Arnold, the New York Times, July 21, 2011.

Pedro Páramo, Juan Rulfo ; translated by Margaret Sayers Peden ; with a
foreword by Susan Sontag. New York : Grove Press, c1994.

The Oxford Book of Latin American Poetry, A Bilingual Anthology, edited by
Cecilia Vicuña and Ernesto Livon Grosman, Oxford University Press, 2009.

I do hope you Ottawans will have a chance to stop by the gallery, especially savour the quiet beauty of John Hewett Hallum's photographs and perhaps to open up the nearby binder and take a peek at a few of the poems I've conjured up as a complement and compliment to his work.

Conversations between poetry and art do not happen often enough, in my opinion. Here's an ongoing conversation to take part in. If you have comments, or if you are inspired by the work and want to write or create your own responses, that would be the cat's meow or pajamas. If you do so, let me know please.

The vernissage is on Friday, September 23 from 6pm to 9pm. and you're invited!

Remembering John Lavery-Celebration of Words and Music

2011-09-17T03:24:00.002-04:00

Foyer - Maison de la Culture de Gatineau, 855 La Gappe Boulevard, Gatineau, QC
Saturday, September 17, 2011 at 2pm; Copies of John's CD "Dignity" and his books will be available for sale.
Here's the FaceBook event listing with further details.

"I’m a hybrid that high-bred
folk find arresting at best,
part propeller, part angel,
I sailed out of the nest."
from "So Sang," a song by John Lavery

thank you, John, for your friendship, your music and your words. we miss you down here on earth.

Dani Couture's Playlist Feature

2011-09-10T12:32:00.002-04:00

Poet, novelist and renaissance woman, Dani Couture has been doing a playlist feature on her site for the last while, asking writers to talk about the music they listen to during the creation process. I chipped in with a playlist for Welcome to Earth, my chapbook with Book Thug here.

Ottawa's Shiny New Fall Literary Season

2011-09-08T16:05:00.003-04:00

here are just a few events i'm looking forward to in the next month or so. details at bywords.ca...

Plan 99 - September 10 Joe Denham and David Hickey
Denham's "the Year of Broken Glass" (Nightwood Editions, Harbour Publishing) sounds like a captivating tale about a man who has to deliver a glass boat to a collector across the Pacific.

I am excited about this because I love captivating novels with the sea as setting. I have never heard or met Joe Denham before, so for me, he is a fresh, new voice. I love the Manx and the Plan 99 Series. David O'Meara is one of Ottawa's most competent and engaging hosts. He doesn't ramble on; his introductions are informative but not fawning and he ensures that pub clientele is quiet during the reading. He makes readers feel comfortable and the beer at the Manx is excellent. My pick is Prince Edward County's Wapoos Cider (i know this isn't strictly a beer) served in a green bottle.

Joe will also be reading the next day at the Sasquatch Writers Performance Series if you aren't sated yet from Saturday.

On October 8, Carleton Wilson will be launching his poetry collection "The Material Sublime" (Nightwood Editions). I have been a fan of Carleton's for his wonderful book cover designs but haven't read any of his work, so am very much looking forward to the reading.the book design is mighty fine too, take a peak

Ottawa International Writers Festival Kick Off with Michael Ondaatje
September 13
The Cat's Table sounds interesting. Ondaatje is a CanLit legend (i apologize if by some weird chance the writer is reading these words, but i doubt it, so onward...) and Joseph Boyden, an excellent writer in his own right/rite/write? will be the host. I like this conversation format that the fest is renowned for.

The Tree Reading Series workshop with Phil Hall and the featured reading by Margaret Christakos
I can't be in two places at once, dag nabit but I recommend this event too. A free workshop by Phil Hall would be fabulous to attend. I suspect it will be crowded. The man is a skilled writer and a humble and approachable soul, someone i would imagine one could feel comfortable sharing one's work with.

I last heard Margaret Christakos read at the A B Series in October, 2009 from her book "Welling" (Your Scrivener Press) and enjoyed the reading tremendously. It's not easy to read long poems to an audience but she did a fine job with her pacing and the work was compelling; the audience was rapt. Christakos is an accomplished writer with numerous poetry collections published and also the driving force behind the course and site that highlights contemporary writing and responses InfluencySalon.

September 17
Celebration of Words and Music: Remembering John Lavery
the highly anticipated launch of John's CD "Dignity" alas without the composer, who his friends still miss dearly. John is a dear friend and brilliant writer whose novel "Sandra Beck" (House of Anansi Press) should be read by anyone who loves a good story, eccentric characters, wordplay and imaginative plots. his music is just as brilliant and it's heart-rending. this is an event not to be missed by his fans, friends and anyone who has yet to discover his work. there will be copies of his fiction available.

the A B Series begins

October 1 Peter Norman and Stuart Ross
i don't know whether Peter will be reading once again from his poetry collection "At the Gates of the Theme Park" (Mansfield Press) and Stuart from "Snowball, Dragon Fly, Jew" (ECW Press), but i'm hoping, given the series' thrust: experimental and performance, that we'll be hearing at least a wee bit of new work by the two of them. if not, i'm happy to hear more of each of the aforementioned books and have a few drinks with these fine good folk who don't come to Ottawa as often as i'd like.

October 15 (my birthday) Zorras and Camille Martin

Zorras is a multi-media troupe based in Scotland. one of its members is the fine and versatile poet Sandra Alland. i have heard and enjoyed Sandra's reading with bill bissett at the writers festival and am looking forward to hearing her again and her group.

Every since I heard and met Camille Martin at the Tree Reading Series a number of years ago, when it was still held in the drippy basement of the Oyal Roak (Royal Oak II on Laurier E.), i have loved her work. At that time she read from "Codes of Public Sleep" (Book Thug), a work i still return to for its memorable and unique lines, particularly those poems having to do with New Orleans. she's had at least one poetry collection since, a collection of sonnets, and I'm looking forward to hearing her read once more.

Of course there are oodles of events taking place for your literary tastes: storytelling, crime novel signings, spoken word showcases and slams, workshops and book sales. For more info, please visit the bywords.ca calendar of literary events. See you at a reading. Let's clink glasses!

Front & Centre's 25th issue hits the streets

2011-09-06T10:15:00.002-04:00

F&C's 25th issue schmecks like F&C always schmecks. good writing, not sappy, not fancy, just plain stories of a realistic bent from the rough side of the tracks.
In the opening interview with writing couple Alexandra Leggat and Salvatore Difalco about his latest book The Mountie of Niagara Falls and Other Brief Stories put out by Anvil Press, Salvatore Difalco says

"Frankly, I don't know what edgy means any more. I don't know if writers in Canada are really capable or permitted to write edgy fiction. But then again, that word is problematic, isn't it? If it means you're writing from the margins ... either by choice or circumstance, well, okay. If it means you're willing to explore certain darker regions of the human psyche and the human condition, I guess it's as efficient an adjective as any." ...

I think F&C is always questioning the idea of edgy in every issue. The stories deal with unpleasant or weird situations. They make you squirm.

In The Balcony Zsolt Alapi writes a memorable piece about a guy's obsession with a Russian woman's underwear, hanging on a clothes line. Her ass sags, there's sweat and hair. From his window, the guy watches her get fucked by her husband at the kitchen sink. There's even lyric beauty in this story, the sight of the blue panty dancing around like angry semaphores on the clothes line. We get a close up of how this guy's mind works, his sexual excitement at the thought of this woman's underwear. His transgressive behaviour. He doesn't just watch. It's a spare story that doesn't shy away from portraying the less than beautiful aspects of life.

David Burdett's The Road to Happy Destiny is a wry piece that documents an alcoholic's return to the bottle, in an unsavoury miserable life. The last line, which I'm not going to reveal to you, is probably one of the best final sentences I've read in fiction. I may have to steal it, it's so good. There's a build up in this story and it doesn't tie up in some neat little Hollywood or old ladies drinking tea Canadian fiction kind of way.

The star of the show for me was Daniel McIsaac's Old Christmas. After reading it, i just wanted to read everything the man has ever written. A young woman hawking hot dogs in Vancouver gets knocked up. What I loved about this was the woman's voice, her language and the writer's clear empathy for her. He makes you care.

There's a lot more in this issue. Good to see the fine writing of Jeremy Hanson-Finger, Stacey Madden's weird tale Mammory Man. So much good stuff.

It's perfect bound this time around, likely to celebrate the fact that this is the 25th issue. No fanfare here, no patting on the back by the editors Matthew Firth and Bill Brown, just good stories and intelligent reviews. Get a copy via Black Bile Press; better yet, subscribe.

Join the party on September 24

2011-09-01T10:11:00.003-04:00

This is a heartfelt plea to my fellow Ottawans to come join us on September 24, 2011 at the annual AIDS Walk for Life. It's not a long walk at all and it's a lot of fun.

Back in the early aughts, I asked Charles what he wanted for his birthday and he told me he wanted to take part in the walk. It happens close to his birthday and our wedding anniversary. In his words, what better way to celebrate. You're surrounded by people, many of them dressed up, all having a great time together and it's for a worthy cause. So the walk is our party for Charles.

I'll let you in on a small secret: every year, Charles tirelessly raises significant funds for the walk--another reason why I love him.

Of course, the walk is not just about celebrating Charles' birthday. Its goal is to raise awareness about AIDS/HIV and money for organizations that help people in the community with AIDS/HIV.

Bywords.ca has been participating almost since we began in the early aughts as part of our ongoing mission to show we care for Ottawa and our fellow residents. Our writers, our volunteers, book sellers, event organizers, subscribers are all part of the community. And you are part of this community.

You don't have to raise any money if you aren't able to. You can just join the team and help to show Ottawans that members of the literary community care as we assemble en masse and walk together when the organizers call out our team name.

You don't have to join the team, you can sponsor us and help us meet or even exceed our goals of raising $500 for Pink Triangle Services, a very worthy non profit organization that, among numerous other supportive activities, offers support and out reach to those with AIDS/HIV and also, germane to our own activities, provides a library with GLBT books and resources.

I will be in my usual white attire, including a tutu. And believe me, when I walk thru downtown in my wee tutu on a Saturday afternoon, I draw attention. That's the goal. There are also motorcycle cops who stop traffic. It's a lot of fun and it's for a good cause. Come join us. Or if you're already on a team, that's terrific. See you at the walk!

Registration begins at 5pm at Marion Dewar Plazy, Ottawa City Hall, and the walk itself is around 7pm. Afterward, we shall warm up at a local public establishment and hoist tankards of ale.

As many as 68,000 people are living with HIV/AIDS in Canada. One third of them don’t even know it. There is no cure and no vaccine to prevent new infections. When you have HIV/AIDS, life gets a lot harder. You can help.

excerpts from Sessions from the Dream House Aria

2011-08-31T21:19:00.002-04:00

has just been published in the third issue of seventeen seconds.

the third issue of seventeen seconds: a journal of poetry + poetics
is now online

edited by rob mclennan, the third issue features new works by:

Judith Copithorne
Gregory Betts
derek beaulieu
and Amanda Earl

as well as an interview with Pearl Pirie by Sean Moreland, and a second
interview between rob mclennan and Stephanie Bolster, ten years after their
first.

seventeen seconds: a journal of poetry and poetics comes out as the
natural extension of the eight issues of Poetics.ca edited by rob mclennan
and Stephen Brockwell. Highlighting the diversity of voice, style,
practice and politic, seventeen seconds continues the resolve to provide a
forum for dialogue on contemporary poetics, with a focus on Canadian
writing. Over the past two decades, the amount of critical writing
published in print literary journals on Canadian poetry, specifically,
seems to have decreased dramatically, but slowly returned through a number
of online journals. seventeen seconds simply wishes to help strengthen the
dialogue and the ongoing conversation about writing through publishing new
writing, and conversation about new writing. How else are we supposed to
learn anything, unless we keep talking?

Feedback and submission queries are most welcome.

rob mclennan, editor
Roland Prevost, managing editor

should bureaucrats be our cultural arbiter?

2011-08-27T09:40:00.002-04:00

August 27, 2011

re: Mural Deserves Its Words, Activists Say

Dear Editor,

Not to diminish the importance of finally having a mural in support of gay rights, but I am dismayed that a City of Ottawa bylaw officer is allowed to decide what and what is not art. This officer clearly has no idea of what art is. Art is not restricted by such narrow guidelines.

I understand that the City has to create rules in order to make revenue on signs, but this decision enforces the letter and not the spirit of its rules. Why can't a message be part of art? I am disappointed in the City of Ottawa's draconian and ill-informed policy.

The bylaw officer's ruling contravenes City of Ottawa cultural policy as written on the site: "The City of Ottawa is committed to fostering an environment in which arts development is valued and artists of all disciplines are supported in the creation of their work." This is not supporting "artists of all disciplines."

Such a limiting attitude limits the cultural landscape and shows disrespect to the numerous Ottawa-area artists who work with both text and visual elements. I think, for example of Michèle Provost, Guillermo Trejo and Dennis Tourbin who incorporate text into their art. Such work has been displayed in the City Of Ottawa gallery. I was at a recent exhibit in Montreal at the Museum of Contemporary Art where cut up texts were on display. There are also many poets who work with text as visual art. Some with direct messages, some without.

Clearly much needs to be done to educate our bureaucrats, since they are being allowed to act as the cultural arbiters of this city. I suggest that the bylaw officer in question work with the visual arts community and the City's own cultural liaison officers to avoid this kind of nonsense in future.

Regards,
Amanda Earl

17 Things I Love About Ottawa

2011-08-24T08:40:00.006-04:00

There are so many things I love about Ottawa in general: its thriving literary scene, of course; parts of town such as Chinatown and Little Italy, the excellent musicians, its walkability, and most of all its sense of community. I got to experience the strength and support of that community in November, 2009 when I almost lost my life to a strange combination of pneumonia and full body sepsis. So many people came together to help Charles and me when I was in the hospital and to show their concern. The medical staff at the Ottawa General Hospital also were amazing. So yes, I'm a fierce defender of Ottawa and all it offers. Here are a few specific things that I love about Ottawa.

Perfection, Satisfaction, Promise, 167 Laurier Avenue West. It's a wee spot beside the Royal Oak II and it's where I like to go after doing research in the Morisset Library at the University of Ottawa. My favourite meal is the steamed vegetables with sweet potato and tahini mayo, washed down with kombucha.

The Ottawa Small Press Book Fair, Jack Purcell Centre, in June and November: my first introduction to any kind of small press activity back in the early aughts, this was an eye opener. You don't hear about things like this in mainstream newspapers, alas. This is where I discovered the chapbook, a flexibile and wonderful form that allows anyone to publish anything in a variety of ways. The chapbook is the fuck you of publishing. It can be very cheap to produce and self-published. The Ottawa fair is special because it is small. There's time to talk to fellow small pressers and socialize after at a local pub. It is also laid back. I've discovered many writers and presses I would never have heard about through the fair.

Byward Market courtyard-in the summer time you will find me perched on a bench with a brown bag full of cherries and a soy latte from Planet Coffee and a couple of molasses cookies for Charles. I love people watching in general and this is a great spot to do so.

Sushi 88, 690 B Somerset W., I go there with friends for lunch, or sometimes on my own. I especially love the inari, which I can rarely find in Ottawa. The atmosphere is relaxed, the service excellent, and it's often quiet before the lunch rush.

The secret gardens of downtown Ottawa-Ottawa is very green with plants and trees everywhere, particularly downtown. If you don't believe me, next time you take a plane, take a look. It's a sea of green. And for downtown, it's amazing. Every season yields gorgeous flowers from crocuses and tulips to peonies and poppies. Therre are also a number of community gardens in my neighbourhood.

The Rideau River Nature Trail behind St. Paul's University. I love the area known as Old Ottawa East with its tiny new agey enclave with Singing Pebble Books, the Green Door and a few others. A walk along the river leads to the Hurdman Transitway Station. It's quiet, you can hear a lot of birds and the view is beautiful.

Strathcona Park in Sandy Hill. Years ago I used to be a regular of the Odyssey Theatre under the Stars and later a Mid-Summer Night's Tree where a bunch of poets would meet to read the work of the greats. It's not a giant park, but the trees are old and big and there are red-winged blackbirds that congregate on the side of the river. (And another spot for grand old trees is the Central Experimental Farm's Arboretum.)

Funk Your Junk, 110 Parent St. near the Byward Market offers recycled clothing, bags that use old album covers or Frito bags, buttons, notebooks made from Timbits boxes, shoes and treasures.

Mags 'N Fags, 254 Elgin St. I love magazines, still, in this age of e-everything, I prefer to hold a magazine in my hands and flip through it. Mags 'N Fags has an extensive collection of literary magazines, more than any other book store in the city.

Venus Envy, 320 Lisgar St., the best sex store in Ottawa with the most approachable and friendly staff. And there's a wall of dildos too. A great selection of books both fiction and reference, videos, a full range of vibrators, massage oils and lubes plus workshops and readings. It's the epicentre of sex positivity in Ottawa.

the Manx Pub, 370 Elgin St. a bar in Ottawa without big screen tvs? I'm in heaven. It's a cozy spot with copper table tops and red velvety seats, an excellent whiskey list, beer and food. Not only that but it is the home of the Plan '99 Reading Series hosted by local poet and playwright David O'Meara. This series takes place from fall to early spring and has hosted many fine writers from all over Canada.

the Ottawa Public Library, Main Branch - I take care of much of my fiction needs here. It saves me from going bankrupt to support my reading addiction. It is close to my home, it is easy to take books out and to renew them on line and the atmosphere is friendly. I have found some pretty obscure titles, such as books by members of Mexico's 21st Century Crack Movement. I know everyone's saying we need a bigger main branch, and I'm not disagreeing, but I still love the library.

Wild Oat Bakery Cafe and Catering, 871 Bank St., in the Glebe. They have rich, strong and tasty coffee and their lavender scones are to die for.

Stubbe Chocolates, 275 Dalhousie. I love their truffles and their spicy hot chocolate.

le Moulin de Provence, Byward Market Building- so many delicious French pastries, especially the eclairs. and it's open on Xmas Day!

The O-Train-oh, I know, it isn't enough and we need more, etc, etc, but I enjoy it and find it a great way to get to Carleton University. Sometimes I have just gotten on and rode it back and forth, especially in winter when icicles are hanging from the rock.

Pub Italia, 434 1/2 Preston St., love their mussels washed down with a bottle of Mort Subite. It's a whimsical pub with crazy stuff all over the place on the walls and a wonderfully quiet abbey where you can have a meal and a drink in peace.

Ottawa winters are my favourite season and my favourite version of winter. This city looks beautiful in winter with the canal and ice sculptures, all our green space covered in snow. As someone who lives in an apartment and doesn't own a car, the winter is not a laborious time for me, but rather joyful and unpredictable. Much of my creative work is done in the winter. Take a walk along Sussex Drive on a winter evening and marvel at the sparkly window displays while the snow falls on your mittens. It's beautiful. And don't forget the Beavertails and hot chocolate.

[photo by Charles Earl]

Tree on Tuesday-Robert Kroetsch Innovative Poetry Award Shortlisted & Winner

2011-08-20T20:34:00.006-04:00

A funny thing happened in Montreal this year when four of the poets shortlisted for the Robert Kroetsch Innovative Poetry Award all came from Ottawa. And one of these, Pearl Pirie, won.

To celebrate this rare alignment of the planets, the Tree Reading Series invited us all to read on Tuesday, August 23, 2011 at 8pm. You will find us upstairs at Arts Court, 2 Daly Avenue.

The readers will be Christine McNair, Pearl Pirie and in the persona of Samandra Eardly: Amanda Earl and Sandra Ridley.

Bios & Info are over at the Tree site.

The award has had a lot of meaning to me since its inception because it is named after Robert Kroetsch, a poet whose work I admire greatly and have even tried to emulate. This year the award is even more poignant with his death in the spring. For me, being on the shortlist for an award in his name is a way of paying tribute to a kind man and a skilled poet. Hope you can join us in the celebration.

Thanks to Brian Pirie for his artistry with the above photo meld. And to Charles Earl for my updated photo, taken at the St. George Subway Station in Toronto last June.

Cities of Stone, People of Dust

2011-08-11T20:51:00.002-04:00

With “Cities of Stone, People of Dust,” Leslie Hossack offers a portrait of three cities, Berlin, Jerusalem and Masada. I was affected most by the photos of people at the Western Wall, formerly called the Wailing Wall, their dark clothes against the bright sunlight and stone wall, the way they leaned into the wall. sadness.

On her site, Leslie Hossack talks about an ongoing tension in her work between the micro and the macro and that tension is definitely prevalent in the photos of this exhibit: the smallness of the soldiers under the large tree, three tiny people holding hands and walking along a massive arch-like bridge, dark clothing against a white wall.

In her poems, Pearl Pirie echoes the elements of the photographs, including the micro/macro aspect: the starkness of the landscape, the hope, sadness and temerity of the people. In “Against this Hot Sun” she writes “we could each lose/the stories that form us,/lose from the white/limestone of our bones…” and in another poem, she writes of capitulation: “we capitulate to what can’t be won.” (The fly on the Western Wall).

In order to write in response to someone else’s interpretation, it is necessary to yield, to capitulate in a sense or to lose oneself to that interpretation. I have said before that in her writing, Pearl is a chameleon and never has that been so evident as with these poems in which she shows her ability to match colours with the colours of the photographs, the understated emotion of the photos.

“who does not/make themselves as small/as one tilting shadow?” (The fly on the Western Wall)

For some poems she switches to colloquial American slang, such as “bro” (Doing the tour), while for others she borrows Arabic words “too much Ma’aasalama in their mouths/not enough peace in their palms” (Men).

“A song becomes a horn,/a car motor, once you stop hearing the words.//a song becomes a dancer like grass/feet tied against the music.//only the blades wing once sounds/lose meaning.” (Men). I found this to be very compelling. Not a horn becomes a song, but the other way round. Feet tied against the music. It’s the “against” that is creating the tension here. Fascinating and heart-wrenching.

In Pearl’s poems there are these beautiful lyrical moments or unique observations that take my breath away:

“the harp/that holds up the road hums the wind.” (Bridge of string).

“repetition is a seed/you have to take all of.” (Children’s memorial)

Even wry humour finds a home in Pearl’s poems:
“heaven and hell’s doors bloom corn smut.”

Don’t get me wrong, there is no over the top sentimentality in these poems and none in the photographs either. What this exhibit offers is a combination of raw truth and stark beauty.

Cities of Stone, People of Dust
Photographs by Leslie Hossack
Poems by Pearl Pirie
Now until September 2, 2011
School of Photographic Arts
The Red Wall Gallery
168 Dalhousie St.

This Dark Economy: flash fiction on Leodegraunce

2011-08-07T18:40:00.003-04:00

My wee story about a woman who has trouble reconciling her bank book is here with an interview with me here

Leodegraunce was founded by Jolie du Pre and its associate editor is Gary Russell. i'm chuffed to have work published by these two writers and editors who i've had the fortune to work with as both editors and writers during my stint as a smut writer back in the day.

You should send them some flash fiction. There's even a small payment.

Can Lit Mags A Twitter

2011-08-05T15:31:00.008-04:00

from time to time i'm going to post directories of twitter accounts in categories that make some semblance of sense to me and perhaps might be helpful to you, those who use twitter or you, those who wish you could, but find the chaos and cacophony unsettling and overwhelming. here's a list of Canadian literary journals that have twitter accounts. some of them are more active than others. their accounts are a good way to quickly find out about calls for submissions and contests, online content, such as supplementary interviews, etc. i am a neophyte at twitter but am slowly making my way and finding it worthwhile. & please let me know which mags i've left out & correct any errors...now...the list...

Arc Poetry Magazine @arcpoetry

Brick, A Literary Journal @BrickMag

Broken Pencil @brokenpencilmag

Bywords.ca @bywordsdotca : i tweet Ottawa's literary events daily and sometimes nag for submissions or mention calls/contests/workshops from other mags. you can get all this from the site, of course, which works well for planning ahead. This is good for the impulsive and absent-minded, which is apt for most of us these days.

Canadian Notes and Queries @CNandQ

the Capilano Review @theCapReview

Contemporary Verse 2 @CV2magazine

Dandelion @dandelionmag

Descant @DescantMagazine

Dragnet Magazine @dragnetmag

Event Magazine @EventMags

fillingStation @fillingstation

Geist Magazine @geistmagazine

Incongruous Quarterly @incongruousq

Matrix Magazine @MatrixMagazine

the Moose and Pussy @mooseandpussy

the New Quarterly @thenewquarterly

Poetry is Dead @poetryisdead

Prism @prismlitmag

the Puritan @thepuritan

Quill and Quire @quillandquire
Room Magazine @RoomMagazine

SubTerrain @subterrain

Taddle Creek @taddlecreek

This Magazine @thismagazine

the Toronto Quarterly @ttqlitjournal

the Walrus @walrusmagazine

Vallum @vallummag

Zouch Magazine @zouchmagazine

Social Media Censors local sex shop Venus Envy

2011-07-27T12:36:00.003-04:00

& more tales of sexual repression:

Apple limits self expression by making the IPad supposedly “free from porn”. It has a Playboy ap, but that ap contains no nudity. Some magazines are made to photoshop nipples from breasts on their covers.

FB removes photo of two men kissing.

FB removes a sex shop’s ad account because it is a sex shop. What the hell?

Censorship abounds. Is it just me or is this world becoming more uptight, more afraid of sex? What happens when we are censored? We become ignorant. Our teens don’t learn about safe sex, contraception and more. You can’t repress sex. Baby, you can’t stop the people.

If you disagree with FB’s censorship policy, I urge you to go to the Venus Envy Ottawa Page and join by pressing “like”. Not only will you receive great info about workshops, events and sales, but you’ll also be showing your support for education, awareness and yes, joy when it comes to sex and sexuality. By the way, Venus Envy has a wonderful books section with educational books about sex, erotica and more. They have a reading coming up on August 25 at 8:00 pm called Reading Out Loud, a celebration of GLBT literature. Note that this event is in its 6th year at the Ottawa store. This year’s event features Jeremy Dias, Karin Galldin, Marcus McCann, Oliver (Ghaida).

Let’s be proud of our sexuality. Let’s not go back to the dark days of repression and shame. Let’s give FB the finger. Join the page.

Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. ~Alfred Whitney Griswold, New York Times, 24 February 1959

Literary Reading Series in Ottawa

2011-07-25T04:11:00.003-04:00

I am excited about upcoming readings and the coming fall literary season.

my ideal reading series

takes place in a well-ventilated room;
is physically accessible to all;
has excellent sound and light;
includes poetry and prose;
includes locals and non locals;
is funded, so able to pay features;
has no more than one hour of readings at a time;
takes place early on a weekday evening or on a weekend afternoon;
has a good site/blog that provides supplementary info about features;
advertises its events well in advance in order to provide for planning;
doesn’t charge a cover to the audience;
has a books table;
is fully plugged in to social media to create interest for the general public.

We have great literary reading series in Ottawa and they have their strengths and weaknesses. One of the main obstacles for me is late night starts, particularly on weekdays and long duration of reading.

I believe readings should last no more than one hour with time to socialize at the venue or at a nearby pub after. I believe that introductions should be kept to a minimum of a minute or two per reader. I enjoy open mics but they have to be strictly limited for time. Only a few series include all genres in their line ups.

I enjoy meeting writers I have long admired, and discovering new ones. I enjoy hearing people read their own work.

Here are our literary series in Ottawa. I am glad they exist.

For more information on these series, click on the links or go to bywords.ca and look at the calendar of events and links page.

A B Series
5th season starts with Stuart Ross & Peter Norman on Oct 1, 2011

above/ground & Factory Reading Series
Janice Williamson at Mother Tongue on July 27, 2011

blUe Mondays on summer haitus

Bywords Quarterly Journal Launches
John Newlove Poetry Award reading at the fall Ottawa International Writers Festival.
Fall launch at Collected Works on November 6, with music by Marie-Josee Houle.

Dusty Owl Reading Series
Storyteller Jan Andrews performs as part of Ottawa Pride on August 21

El Dorado, Ottawa's only multi-lingual reading series

In/Words Reading Series
Cameron Anstee is the feature on July 27, 2011

Plan 99 on summer hiatus

Sasquatch Literary Performance Series on summer hiatus

Tree Reading Series
Phil Hall is the feature on July 26, 2011

Voices of Venus
next season starts soon

also the Ottawa International Writers Festival which takes place in the spring and fall & VerseFest which takes place in the spring.

Also local bookstores such as Collected Works, Mother Tongue hold readings,
and the Raw Sugar Café and Venus Envy occasionally has readings.

If I am forgetting other literary series in Ottawa, please let me know.
& i'd be interested to know of what you think makes for a good literary series.

Gems from Apollinaire's bargin bin

2011-07-22T07:57:00.004-04:00

these are books i covet, already have and love or am intrigued by based on buzz. check out these bargoons and more over at Apollinaire's Bookshoppe (selling books that no one wants to buy):

Nathalie Stephens, the Sorrow and the Fast of It (Nightboat Books, 2007) - $10

Jenny Sampirisi, Is/Was (Insomniac Press, 2008) - $10

Alfred Purdy, the Cariboo Horses (McLelland & Stewart, 1965) - $25

rob mclennan, Bagne or Criteria for Heaven (Broken Jaw Press, 2000) - $5

rob mclennan, harvet: a book of signifiers (Talonbooks, 2001) - $5

Barry McKinnon, the Centre (the Caitlin Press, 1995) - $6

Michael Holmes, 21 Hotels (above/ground press, 1998) - $10

Kyle Buckley, the Laundromat Essay (Coach House Books, 2008) - $8.50

stop by the shoppe and spend some ducats and florins on these beauties and more...

Tree's Open Mic Prize: hunka hunka frying love

2011-07-13T09:53:00.003-04:00

so the theme was "Ultimately, why Elvis left the building." my poem tied for the win with Jennifer Pederson's poems, and i particularly enjoyed her lithium villanelle. i had fun responding to the challenge. i love whimsy and sillyness. if you want to get me going, give me a challenge. thanks to Tree for the incentive and the dough. and don't forget to come to Tree on July 26 because Phil Hall is the feature. huzzah. here's the poem...

a hunka hunka frying love

Elvis stands at a stove
in his blue suede shoes
in Satan’s kitchen cooking up
infernal batches of deep fried
peanut butter & banana sandwiches
for the demons & the succubae

This is the Las Vegas Elvis
in his suit of lights
crooning Blue Hawaii as he wields
his spatula like a microphone
swivelling his hips in between bread flips
& shaking loose strands of his palmanade locks
off his forehead & into the frying pan

Afterward he splits a bowl of candy-coloured
barbiturates with Townes, Janis & Kurt Cobain
& they hop a damned train to Memphis
to sing in Beelzebub’s choir

The crypt at Forest Hill stands empty
his loving fans like to tell the tale
not too far from the graves of confederate soldiers
if you stand at the gates of Graceland
in Tennessee on the 4th Chicksaw Bluff
on August 16 at 3:30 in the afternoon
hold yourself still
take a deep breath
& you’ll smell another sandwich frying
especially for you…

Meet the Presses booty

2011-07-12T12:30:00.004-04:00

Apt. 9 Press

Jeremy Hanson-Finger,
The Delicious Fields (apparently the last copy)

Emergency Response Unit

Gil Adamson, an untitled broadside beautifully designed by Scream organizer Bill Kennedy
Carey Toane, Stowaway (exquisite old fashioned wallpaper cover)
Dinosaur Porn (with Ferno House)

Gesture Press

Nicholas Power, the Steady Pull of a Curious Dog with drawings by Camilla Burgess

Horse of Operation

Martin Hazelbower, You Can’t Get There From Here: twenty inventions (pictured above)

Serif of Nottingham Editions/Gary Barwin

a two-sided Basho green froggie t-shirt by Gary Barwin, Flying Camel Press

Toronto Poetry Vendors

stuck two loonies in the machine and got a yellow folded work
by Pasha Malla: Bad Humanitarian Aid Organizations (huzzah!)

Underwhich Editions/Paul Dutton

Ballet of the Speech Organs: Bob Cobbing on Bob Cobbing
as interviewd by Steven Ross Smith
Sandra Braman and Paul Dutton, spokesheard, longspoon press
Paul Dutton, Hair (chapbookpublisher)

especially keen on Junction Books, sunnyoutsidepress & Red Iron Press, which had some fantastic stuff, but i ran outta dough.

At the AngelHousePress table, we had a $1,2,3,4, 5 sale and sold out of many chapbooks we brought with us and completely sold out of rob mclennan’s house, a (tiny) memoir and my signs of the apocalypse magazine, issue 1-A; now i can move on two the 2nd issue. we didn’t sell that many broadsides this time around, but a lot of conversation revolved around them, which is great.

The Meet the Presses Screaming Chapbook Fair was a great opportunity to mix with fellow chapbookers and witness various methods of production. It was also fun to see many of my Toronto friends again or for the first time. I also enjoyed gawking at some lovely young Torontonian men. Gosh they make them pretty over there by the lake.

Come celebrate summer with Bywords on July 17

2011-07-11T09:10:00.005-04:00

Dear Ottawa poetry and music enthusiasts, I invite you to spend the afternoon of Sunday July 17 enjoying great poems and songs at our summer reading, which will take place at the newly renovated and spacious Collected Works Bookstore and Coffee Shop.

The festivities begin at 2pm and admission is free. We will pass the hat and give you a copy of the summer Bywords Quarterly Journal. This is also a great time to stock up on your summer reading and indulge in your caffeine addiction.

Ottawa is blessed with a number of fine independent bookstores and I’m thrilled that Collected Works will be the home of our readings this year.

Come listen to the poetry of
Allison Armstrong, co-host with Faye Estrella of the excellent series Voices of Venus;

Steven Artelle, Ottawa’s literary historian and talented artist (see the covers of the Bywords Quarterly Journal for his Parliamentary line art);

L. Garrison, who is an emerging writer and recent University of Ottawa graduate;

and Sean Moreland, co-host along with Aaron Kozak of the blUe Mondays reading series and recipient of the 2008 Bywords’ John Newlove Poetry Award. You can still find a few copies of his chapbook, Lupercalia through the Bywords online store.

On the 17th it will also be a pleasure to welcome spoken word sensation and musician Brad Morden. If you love the ukulele and big smiles, you’ll love Brad. Listen to some of his music here.

One of our mandates is to promote local writing, music and art. This month’s cover of the Bywords Quarterly Journal features the artwork of local artist Colin White whose wonderful series of Ottawa confectionary stores has been on display at Raw Sugar on Somerset West. Come by to the reading and pick up the summer issue of the BQJ to get a taste of his art, and some of Ottawa’s finest poetry.

And if you’d like a preview what’s in store, tune in to CHUO’s Click Here on Wednesday, July 15 at 5pm. Mitchell Caplan will speak to me and Brad Morden and we'll hear some of Brad Morden’s music. And on Friday, July 15 at 7:30 am, have a listen to Susan Johnston’s Friday Special Blend on Carleton’s CKCU for some poetry by Sean Moreland and Allison Armstrong. And a happy anniversary to Susan who has been hosting the show for nine years.

Come celebrate the summer with Bywords on Sunday, July 17 at 2pm at Collected Works. Take in some poetry and music, sip some coffee, buy some books. It'll be grand!

Ron Sexsmith Shortlisted for Polaris 2011

2011-07-06T14:47:00.002-04:00

i couldn't be happier to see Ron Sexsmith on the Polaris 2011 shortlist for Long Player Late Bloomer. for those who haven't had a chance to listen to Sexsmith or who dismiss his work as easy listening, i think you should take a listen (again) with an open mind. music enthusiasts and song writers understand the complexity and memorability of his melody constructions. his voice has a broad range and he takes chances with a lot of the songs he creates. i think he will be considered to be one of Canada's most brilliant song writers of this era.

Long Player Late Bloomer is a strong album. it is hope mixed with risk. every album Sexsmith makes is about risk and taking a chance, something so many recording artist are afraid to do these days, pumping out the same old plonk that zooms to the top of the charts, whatever they are. (think Nickelback).

there is variety in his style, there is an earnestness and darkness mixed with light in his lyrics and his melodies communicate what is often difficult to articulate in words.

coupled with Love Shines, the recent documentary's portrayal of the road to creating Long Player Late Bloomer with producer Bob Rock, the album is even more meaningful. those who love the music of Ron Sexsmith feel his struggle in a business that is more about the sound byte than craft, the bling of a repeated catch phrase than original lyrics.

here's Believe It When I See It from Long Player Late Bloomer

Cafe Nostalgica, 603 Cumberland to be demolished

2011-07-06T12:43:00.002-04:00

I arrived at the Café Nostalgica yesterday for the blUe Mondays reading series (a magical night of sound and words) and there was a big honking sign out front:

“This building to be demolished to make way for a cold, generic building with no history or humanity.”

Ok, that’s not what the sign said exactly. I may be paraphrasing, but it might as well have. Am I not the only one who is horrified by this pending demolition?

These days U of O is tearing down buildings left and right. Here’s footage of 178 Laurier being demolished, and a bit of its history.

I don’t know the history of 603 Cumberland, the site of the Graduate Students Association & Café Nostalgica, but I do know the café has been in operation since 1995 in that location and has been the centre of the U of O’s art and culture scene more than any place else on campus.

Café Nostalgica is where I cut my poetic teeth, so to speak, standing at the open mic as part of Trevor Tchir & Kristy McKay’s Thursday night open stage and staying for incredible music and poetry til the wee smalls.

Kristy and I were taking Seymour Mayne’s Advanced Creative Writing Poetry Workshop at the University of Ottawa in the fall of 2001, after having taking the first workshop in 2000/2001. Kristy recruited a bunch of us to help her add poetry to the evening, which was mostly an open stage for music.

This is where I first encountered the late Steve Sauvé, whose hilarious and poignant poetry both make me laugh and broke my heart.

This is where I first heard the Max Middle Sound Project, with Max, Melanie Little and Peter Norman doing Moon Potatoes.

This is where I first heard the amazing music of Trevor Tchir, Rozalind MacPhail, John Carroll, Kevin Grant, Mélissa Laveaux, Peter Webb, the Lighthouse Keepers, the early pre-Soul Jazz Orchestra Phil Lafreniere and so many more.

This is where Lenny served Charles and I jumbo rumbos and the reason why we staggered out of there at 1 am, sadly missing out on even more music and poetry because we had to get up to go to work.

To commemorate the 2nd anniversary of the open stage in 2003, Trevor had a bunch of us gather at the café one evening to record a live CD called Thursday Heroes: Live at Café Nostalgica. I had the pleasure of performing my Drum Song poem with the help of Phil Lafreniere on the drums.

The café continues to put on great nights of music and poetry and display artwork by local artists. A few years back I even reviewed its food for Cheapeats Ottawa.
I will miss the old red brick house on Cumberland, and I know many of you will too. I wish Ottawa U would consider the heritage of its buildings and their history. Too many of its buildings are cold, concrete and uninviting.

“Set a candle on every table in this room,
The Thursday Heroes are bound to be here soon.”
Trevor Tchir, Thursday Heroes

July 9: Toronto's Meet The Presses Screaming Chapbook Market

2011-07-04T12:31:00.002-04:00

We, the (fallen) angels of AngelHousePress, shall be at the fair with copies of limited edition chapbooks, broadsides & possibly a bit of brimstone. Hope to see you there.

I'm chuffed about this particular fair because it is a "chapbook" fair. there may be a few spines there, at least among the vendors; although angels have no spines, but primarily this is a fair that celebrates the chapbook: those wee unsung pages put together with thread or staples or bolts or glue, somewhat ephemeral, booklets for zines, poetry, prose, manifestos, soup recipes, comics and what have you. to my mind, there is no form more flexible than the chapbook, which can be any shape, any size, any colour, any style from letterpress to manual pencil scrawlings.

if you're in Toronto, please come by and help us celebrate the chapbook.

Women writers in Ottawa

2011-07-04T09:53:00.002-04:00

suggestions for future Ottawa Women’s Worlds conferences

i noticed that the conference, which is taking place now, has a variety of Arts & Culture events featuring local and out of town women. i thought i would offer some suggestions for future organizers of such. now if you’re a frequent reader of my blog, you know i don’t cotton to gender segregation, but since this event is happening anyway, might as well help with suggestions:

Sandra Ridley, poet & author of the award winning collection Fall Out (Hagios Press);

Pearl Pirie, poet & winner of the Robert Kroetsch Innovative Poetry Award, a book forthcoming with Snare Books, been shed bore out with Chaudiere Books;

Rhonda Douglas, poet and fiction writer, Some Days I think I Know Things (Signature Editions);

Elisabeth Harvor, poet, fiction writer & essayist, most recent poetry collection An Open Door in the Landscape (Palimpsest Press);

Gabriela Goliger, fiction writer, most recent novel Girl Unwrapped (Arsenal Pulp Press);

Elizabeth Hay, multiple award winning novelist, recent book Alone in the Classroom (McClelland & Stewart);

Jennifer Whiteford, fiction writer, Grrl (Gorsky Press), zine creator;

Nadine McGinnis, award-winning poet & fiction writer, most recent book Two Hemispheres (Brick Books);

Susan McMaster, poet & literary editor, most recent poetry collection Paper Affair (Black Moss Press);

Ronnie R. Brown, award winning poet, most recent poetry collection Rocking on the Edge (Black Moss Press);

Terry Ann Carter, poet & haikuist, most recent poetry collection A Crazy Man Thinks He’s Earnest (Black Moss Press)

note that i’ve included only those with published books & haven’t included women who do spoken word. the latter because there is one event in the program called Breaking Sound on Wednesday (see the Bywords.ca calendar of events) and i’m not sure which have been included. there is a graphic novella launch on Tuesday night, so words have not been entirely forgotten. most of the Arts & Culture events from what i can see seem to be multi-media and music.

& there are probably a whole pile of other women writers i have forgotten or don’t know of. it just seems a shame that at a conference specifically celebrating women’s voices, the audience is not getting a chance to hear some of Ottawa’s strongest and most creative voices. perhaps another time? & if other cities are having similar conferences, i urge you to take a look at the literary talent in your city and be sure to include in your program. the program is fairly complex; perhaps some of these women or women authors from other cities appear in the plenary sessions. if not now, in the future, please.

Canada 100: music for Canada Day

2011-06-30T22:49:00.002-04:00

well, this is embarrassing...i tried to create a playlist that includes all our regions, but this, this is so Ontario heavy. my apologies. perhaps you can suggest bands past and present to represent the areas that are so poorly represented on my list.

here's the youtube playlist

in my attempts to make this list, i have explored and discovered musicians i haven't heard of before, such as Annabelle Chvostek, Jerry Alfred and Lucie Idlout. the whole idea is to learn & explore. perhaps you can make your own Canada 100 or 50 or 10 list. i'd be interested to see it. the main thing is to celebrate Canadian talent and skill. Canada Day seems like a suitable reason for it. otherwise i'd be painting the flag black and mourning our current political situation, so here's a distraction for me and others who have similar tristesse...

Nunavut
Lucie Idlout

Yukon
Jerry Alfred

British Columbia
the Be Good Tanyas
Luke Doucet
Stephen Fearing
Lily Frost
Headwater
Ndidi Onukwulu

Alberta
Jann Arden
Bill Bourne
K.D. Lang
Loverboy
Rae Spoon
Trevor Tchir

Saskatchewan
Colin James
Buffy Sainte Marie
Wide Mouth Mason

Manitoba
Susan Aglukark
the Guess Who
Chantal Kreviazuk
Loreena McKennitt
the Weakerthans

Ontario
Bryan Adams
Kiran Ahluwalia
Barenaked Ladies
Blackie and the Rodeo Kings
Blue Rodeo
Bruce Cockburn
the Burning Hell
the Cowboy Junkies
Kathleen Edwards
Peter Elkas
the Great Lake Swimmers
Emm Gryner
Emily Haines
Sarah Harmer
Kyp Harness
Peter Katz
Avril Lavigne
Rozalind MacPhail
Madison Violet
Max Webster
Danny Michel
Moxy Fruvous
Murray McLauchlan
Alanis Morissett
Alannah Myles
Jenny Omnichord
Rheostatics
Stan Rogers (but he should be listed as a Maritimer, me thinks)
Parachute Club
the Sadies
Ron Sexsmith
Oliver Schroer
the Shuffle Demons
Andrea Simms-Karp
the Skydiggers
Bob Snider (via Nova Scotia)
Andy Stochanksy
Sarah Slean
Kurt Swinghammer
the Tragically Hip
Andrew Vincent
Wax Mannequin
Royal Wood
Neil Young

Quebec

Arcade Fire
the Aurian Haller Band
Boogat
Annabelle Chvostek
Leonard Cohen
Coeur de Pirate
les Cowboys fringants
Angela Desveaux
Marie-Josée Houle
Kashtin
Daniel Lanois
Jean Leloup
Lynn Miles
the McGarrigles
Snailhouse
Martha Wainwright
Rufus Wainwright

New Brunswick
Eric’s Trip
Julie Doiron
Stompin’ Tom Connors

Nova Scotia
Charlie A’Court
Jill Barber
Feist
Mary Jane Lamond
Ashley MacIsaac
Sarah McLachlan
Anne Murray
Joel Plaskett
the Trews

Newfoundland & Labrador

Mark Bragg
Amelia Curran
Great Big Sea
the Punters

Prince Edward Island
Teresa Doyle

&....

in some cases there were musicians i wanted to include but they had no videos that i could find.

literary fun between the fireworks & royal brouhaha this weekend

2011-06-29T22:43:00.003-04:00

Friday, July 1
Open Mic Night at the Umi Café for music, poetry & whimsy-8pm

Saturday, July 2
Nuit Noire opening night at the Cube Gallery, the vernissage launches a month long artsy celebration of the nuit. on Saturday at 8:30pm James Bremner will read from his essay in the book "Let there be Night", telling how he lost his fear of the dark and found a little courage. Can there be courage without fear, as we crowd together in over-lit cities? After that there will be a big gala sidewalk party. Music by the fabulous John Gillies & the Telescopes. More here.

Sunday, July 3
Dusty Owl’s Canada Day Weekend Picnic on Victoria Island featuring London, Ontario poet & sound gadabout Penn Kemp, 2pm
and to stretch the weekend even longer…

Monday, July 4
Ottawa Youth Poetry Slam Finals at the Ottawa Public Library, Main Branch, 5pm plus Loh El

Tuesday, July 5
blUe mOndays on Tuesday at Café Nostalgica, 603 Cumberland St. with Penn Kemp, Jamie Bradley, Carmel Purkis, Christine McNair, Grant Wilkins, Sandra Ridley and Sean Moreland

in between the fireworks & the royal brouhahaha get yourself out to hear some words.

& for the poets among you, Ottawa residents, students & workers now or before, send poems to submissions at bywords dot ca for consideration for the August issue of bywords.ca. you have time to smell the roses, you have time to send us poems. check out the guidelines first on the site.

[photo by Charles Earl]

an open letter to poets with long, rambly intros at readings

2011-06-28T05:40:00.002-04:00

Dear Poet,

In your work, you make intentional choices to create a poem. You are rigorous about economy of language, the sound of the words, a line’s balance & rhythm, the images you choose and the layout of the poem on the page and in the air. I suggest that you apply this same rigour to your introductions. If your poem needs an introduction, keep it short. Remember that this is your first contact with your audience and they will easily lose interest. You do your poem a disservice when your introductions lose the attention of the audience, when you mumble and when you ramble.

If you have a lot to say about a poem, perhaps you should consider writing a poem about the poem or choosing another poem that requires less supplementary information. If you feel you need to explain a poem to the audience, perhaps it isn’t the right poem to read to this particular group, or perhaps the work itself is lacking and needs a good edit or you aren’t having faith in the audience’s ability to catch on. Trust your writing.

I suggest you care as much about your introductions as you do about the poems themselves. Rehearse them, edit them and make them compelling. Or drop them and make the poem itself stronger. The poem, like the cheese, stands alone.

Sincerely,
an audience member.

booty from the fair

2011-06-27T15:47:00.005-04:00

Anvil Press
wasn’t at the fair; they are way far away in BC; however, Arc Poetry Magazine was giving away books they haven’t reviewed and thanks to Kate’s kindness, i scored Suicide Pslams by Mari-Lou Rowley, & i admit to getting it merely because i liked the title and the pretty green cover, so we’ll see…
Apt. 9 Press
Cameron Anstee, She May Be Weary (published for Cameron’s reading at blUe mOndays last April, which i missed; beautifully made, of course, and someone’s been nipping at the Brautigan;)
Jim Smith, Exit Interviews (purchased at the pre-fair reading because Smith gave a killer reading, especially the pieces from the gorgeously made EI;)
Monty Reid, Site Conditions (because i want to have all of Reid’s garden series; in particular i enjoy the way he includes historical & biblical gardens in this series, each one of these garden works leads outward to exploration & see Pearl’s notes here.)
CURVD H&Z
a wee slim yellow type-written work by Stuart Ross from 1999 called Home Shopping with a cover designed by jwcurry. it was a mere $5; most other things on the table i couldn’t afford, but salivated over, as i always do.
Ex Hubris
Vis>Cue-Cue with some of my fav poets and pals: Christine McNair, Jamie Bradley, Sean Moreland, a reading i missed a few years ago, apparently the 2nd last of two copies; glad i snagged it.
Exile Editions
also not at the fair, but pooka press, all the way from BC, was here, with works by Catherine Owen; i picked up her first book: Somatic, the Life and Work of Egon Schiele (1998), something i’ve been looking forward to reading for ages; and speaking of Catherine Owen, i also picked up Caneide, 30 sonetti in cagnesco, a collaborative book of sonnets in English and Italian, made with Joe Rosenblatt & published by Shena Editore as a supplement of “Rivista di Studi Canadese”; Catherine gave a reading with Warren Dean Fulton in my living room not long ago and i picked up more of her wonderful books.
In/Words
a few of their publications traded with Dave Currie for a few AHP chapbooks & my own broadside from “ghazals against the gradual demise”: in/words verses put out for VerseFest; rescue poems by Jesslyn Delia Smith; In/Words 10.2 lovingly dedicated to John Lavery & including his semi-colon/full stop joke; with a story by Stuart Ross, who turns up in the most surprising places.
Pedlar Press
for us early birds, a sale: $5 per book; get there later and you end up paying full price. nice for me, who is always early and usually chided or made fun of for such. was a delight to speak with Beth Follett once again. i have never seen her at our wee fair before, so this was grand:
Antonella Briton, Sex Libris (the first published book of Pedlar & beautifully designed (gifted to me by Beth due to sweet excuse of infinitesimal flaws of cover);
Gregory Betts, the Others Raisd in Me (another i’ve had my eye on; i love to plunder & Shakespeare seems a fine object of plunder. i like the wit of the title and the design.;)
Joanne Page, Watermarks (with a beautiful cover by the author herself. when i was perusing the book to consider its purchase, i read from the prose poem “White”: “Pigment, writes Cennini in Il Libro dell’ Arte, comes in little cakes like goblets or drinking glasses.” SOLD!)
Ken Sparling, Book (i’ve read a number of reviews on this book and it sounds good, so i’m glad to have it;)
Souvankham Thamma Vongsa Small Arguments (i’ve had my eye on this book for donkey’s years);
Beth gave me a tip on one of my favourite Newfoundlanders, Joel Thomas Hynes. his book Right Away Monday made me drink more Guinness than i should. the book/film Down to the Dirt was entertaining and memorable. A Newfoundland press called Running the Goat has done a beautiful letterpress chapbook of his God Help Thee: A Manifesto, which i snapped up. & what's more, Pedlar is going to publish a book by Joel in the fall. i am most excited to hear.
i'm also very much looking forward to Sandra Ridley's Post-Apothecary, a new Pedlar Press poetry book that will be launching this fall. you know what the slogan of Pedlar Press is: "Making no compromise with public taste." hip, hip, hurray for Pedlar Press!
Phafours
free home baked and delicious raisin cake, pickles & a free wee folded booklet called re dis un cover, sweetly designed & illustrated by, i suspect, Pearl Pirie.
SunnyOutside Press
all the way from Buffalo, NY, they make wonderful books of poetry & prose, and have some works created on LetterPress. i bought two poetry books by a woman i have never heard of: Micah Ling: Sweetgrass & Three Islands. it was a combo of flipping thru & having a few lines jump out at me, the beautiful design of both books and wanting to support a press that came all the way from the US of A to our wee Canadian berg.
the Workhorsery
non-traumatizing Canadian fiction from Toronto; i admit that i loved their logo and designs so much, i wanted to buy something from them, and the vendors sold Pitouie by Derek Winkler so well, including a lovely book cover with that fabulous logo, i couldn’t resist.

the fair was wondrous this time, more so than usual because we had so many out of town visitors. most especially pooka press run by head pooka Warren Dean Fulton from Vancouver. i was thankful he made enough money to get home by Greyhound. the turn out was wonderful. we were told it was quite a bit better than some of the fairs others have gone to recently. i am pleased for Bywords and AngelHousePress, my own labours of love. we managed to sell numerous copies of the BQJ, broadsides, chapbooks and had fun in the bargin.

of course my favourite moments were seeing my dear Charles running around with devil horns on his head and taking beautiful black and white Polaroids of the vendors, many of which will gradually make their way up to timezero.ca, his Polaroid site. he is my whimsical co-conspirator.

i was pleased to chat with vendors and visitors, even the one who bled on Pearl’s chapbook, “over my dead corpus,” which seemed alarming, but somehow fitting. we prefer money to blood usually though.

thanks to rob mclennan, who is good enough to keep running this fair and doesn’t receive enough thanks by far, nor money. he, along with his two presses above/ground press & Chadiere Books (run with Jennifer Mulligan) were, as always, the heart of the fair with umpteen broadsides, chapbooks, trade books by great, unsung writers across Canada, free coffee and wit. the next fair will be in the fall. i will have one and possibly two new chapbooks from AngelHousePress for sale. stay tuned.

AngelHousePress has been invited and will attend the Meet the Presses Screaming Chapbook Market in Toronto on July 9. i have to say i am very psyched to be part of this fair, along with Apt 9 Press, BookThug, Emergency Response Unit, Gesture Press, Horse of Operation,Imago Press, Junction Books, Laurel Reed Books, Proper Tales Press, Red Iron, Serif of Nottingham, Talking Pictures, Toronto Poetry Vendors, Twoffish Press, and Underwhich Editions. these are presses that love the chapbook, as we do. we publish raw talent, ragged edges and rebels. we are spineless and have no intention of adding vertebrae to our angel wings. hope to see you at the MTP fair.

won't you come to the fair?

2011-06-25T06:29:00.003-04:00

today is the ottawa small press book fair & i’m excited. i have written often of this fare, but i will do so again because i want to convey the wonder of it, the essentialness of it. hell, this is an entreaty. i urge you to attend.

iknow
you have a whole pile of things to do today.
the weather has been inconducive to leaving your comfortable abode.
it’s hard to find a place to park your car.
you have very little money to spend.

but
if you write, if you read, if you are tired of the conventional nonsense that comes from large cookie cutter operations, you must come to the fair.
if you enjoy poetry by rule breakers, if you like raw talent, if you are a fan of ragged edges, you must come to the fair.
if you love the book in all its forms & appreciate the handmade beauty of small books, you must come to the fair.
if you want to find out more about some of the small press publishers in Ottawa and beyond, you must come to the fair.
if you want to find books & chapbooks you will never see in any big box bookstore, you must come to the fair.
if you have very little money, you can find chapbooks and broadsides for free, so you must come to the fair.
if you are a supporter & lover of independent ideas, rebels and those that kick against the pricks, you must come to the fair.

Bywords will have a small gift for those who come to the table, while quantities last.
AngelHousePress will hitch its halo to the Bywords table and shall offer wee treasures by some of Ottawa’s most delectable writers.

pooka press is here all the way from Vancouver and has a wonderful selection of chapbooks from the well known and lesser known poets of this era. also the pooka will be selling books by Catherine Owen & her work is beautiful & resonates.

what else can i tell you?

Apt. 9 Press will have chapbooks of beauty and substance, including the newly published Exit Interviews by Jim Smith, who gave a fabulous reading last night.

Chaudiere Books has a new book by Joe Blades that is worth the price of admission to the fair, even though the fair is free. There are always more chapbooks to discover by above/ground press in various colours and styles, i’m sure there will be some you can try on and buy for a mere $4 a chapbook.

I’m hoping local publisher Buschek Books will be there with its array of fine titles. Last spring, Toronto’s renegade BookThug was there, including the amazingly talented Phil Hall. it was an honour to get him to sign the Little Seamstress, my favourite book of poems of 2010.

and speaking of Pedlar Press, i hear that Beth Follett will be at the fair. you don’t want to miss Pedlar Press, whose books are beautiful & splendid. & at prices lower than you find in stores.

Adam Thomlison with his 40 Watt Spotlight will be shining at the fair, with zany & comical fiction that will make you think twice, but that’s alright.

I hope Colin White will be there with his colourful graphic comics.

jwcurry of 1cent will be there. small works of significance & beauty that are off any path you have ever taken. you don’t want to miss him.

Sometimes there is music. One year Punchy Writers/DC Books from Montreal showed up & it was a pleasure to see David McGimpsey & Jason Camlot at the fair. I believe someone even played guitar.

& afterwards, drinks & good company at a local tavern where we wrap up, count our farthings and talk about stuff & nonsense…

i expect to see you there, Ottawans. don’t disappoint me.

the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair takes place today from noon to 5pm at the Jack Purcell Community Centre, Rm 203.

Robert Kroetsch: 1927 - 2011

2011-06-22T17:27:00.002-04:00

i am saddened to hear of the death of Robert Kroetsch, a vibrant and kind man who i had the pleasure of meeting at the U of Ottawa post-modernism conference in 2008. i gave him a copy of my The Sad Phoenician's Other Woman (above/ground press) written in homage to The Sad Phoenician. and he said kind words about it, which is one of the thrills of my poetic life so far. here is a repost of my essay: "Notes on The Sad Phoenician’s Other Woman: Experiencing Robert Kroetsch’s Poetry In A Fever" because i sing his praises and it's time to remember and celebrate a great man, a great poet and fiction writer, one of Canada's best. I offer my deepest condolences to his family and friends and raise a glass to Robert Kroetsch. You will be greatly missed.

Notes on The Sad Phoenician’s Other Woman:
Experiencing Robert Kroetsch’s Poetry In A Fever

I knew of Kroetsch, had heard references to him all the time, which is no surprise given his status as an influential and well-known Canadian writer, but I’d never read his work. In the winter of 2008, I stumbled upon “Completed Field Notes, The Long Poems of Robert Kroetsch” (the University of Alberta Press, 2000).

I don’t know about you, but for me there are so many writers I hear about who I mean to get around reading some day. Robert Kroetsch was like that for me, and when I finally did get around to him, I was blown away.

I love his wit, his double entendres, his easygoing style. I felt, in part, like I was home, like I’d found an influence. Before Kroetsch I’d also been galvanized by the writing of Lisa Robertson and Dennis Cooley in much the same way and had to explore such things as the long line and the sentence based on their work.

In this case, I couldn’t help but write a poem of my own, inspired by “The Sad Phoenician” (first published in its entirety by Coach House Press in 1979). I read Kroetsch in a fever (literally, due to a flu, I had a 100 degree temperature) and I wrote “The Sad Phoenician’s Other Woman” (above/ground press, 2008) in a fever too…in just over three days and three nights. I really did feel a quickening and a shiver as I read

This stone
becomes a hammer
of stone, this maul

is the colour
of bone (no,
bone is the colour
of this stone maul).

The rawhide loops
are gone, the
hand is gone, the
buffalo’s skull
is gone;

the stone is
shaped like the skull
of a child.

[I from Stone Hammer Poem, Prologue and reprinted as part of the Stone Hammer Poems in 1975 by Oolichan Books and included in the “Completed Field Notes”]

That was the first poem of Kroetsch’s I ever read, and I had to read more; I’ve never been so glad that I had a whole thick book of long poems to discover. We were in the middle of that crazy snow storm last year where the snow kept falling and falling and falling, I was sick and couldn’t go anywhere. And I didn’t want to.

In his author’s note at the back of the book, Kroetsch explains that the “Completed Field Notes” represents a body of work which appeared over a period of fifteen years, each long poem published individually over the years and later together as “Field Notes” (General Store Publishing, 1981), then by McClelland and Stewart as “Completed Field Notes” in 1989 and when that was almost out of print, reprinted by the University of Alberta Press in 2000 with an introduction by Kroetsch’s long time friend and another renowned Canadian writer, Fred Wah.

In the author’s note, Kroetsch writes “Since the eloquence of failure may be the only eloquence remaining in this our time, I let these poems stand as the enunciation of how I came to a poet’s silence. And I like to believe that the sequence of poems, announced in media res as continuing, is, in its acceptance of its own impossibilities, completed.”

I think this idea of failure, the poetics of failure is what draws me to Robert Kroetsch’s writing. I have always been intimidated by writing that seems to come from a voice on high from writers who, deliberately or not, portray themselves as having the answers. Writers like Kroetsch (and there is really no one like him) don’t promise answers or some kind of heightened and sensitive insight based on their role as Poet with a capital P. I don’t believe anyone has that kind of role. I don’t like the way it distances the reader and the writer. Kroetsch’s writing didn’t make me feel distant from him or his work, but rather kindred.

In his introduction, Fred Wah talks about how Kroetsch’s poem “Mile Zero” “attempts to avoid design, to occupy an unresolved transition. The poem as field becomes a translucent white surface of trajectory, a field of particles that, above all else, seeks constant motion and resists rest.” and later...

“Think of ‘field notes’ as temporary, as momentary gestures that interpolate possibility. Perhaps even as investigations into the potential for narrative. Or at least the poem’s capacity for narrative. Then think of narrative not as a predictable line of action and consequence but as a maze of sudden twists, obstacles, impossibilities, possibilities.
Kroetsch’s Field notes are not only lessons in the naïveté of completion, lessons, in fact, on being lost, there are also a manual of field note technique.”

This notion of a long poem as a maze of “twists, obstacles, impossibilities and possibilities” excites me and makes me want to write more long poems. I think the long poem gives one space to set up and shape these twists and gives the reader space, time and rhythm to become compelled by them.

I particularly like the idea of “in media res” or starting in the middle or as I like to think of it, depicting moments as they occur rather than seeing them in hindsight. I was trying to do this with “The Sad Phoenician’s Other Woman,” a long poem about a woman who, to quote “The Sad Phoenician,” “now loves adverbs.” I wrote the poem in the spirit of the Kroetsch poem and worked some of his lines from the poem in my own, playing with his ideas of working with other sources to create a poem. Like Kroetsch, I had fun disrupting systems, particularly grammar. I used grammar as a means to mislead and create ambiguity in the poem.

Some readers have described my poem as a poem of conquest since it engages with the sexual exploits a woman initiates with various male accomplices. The tone is a repetition of the tongue-in-cheek bravado from the Kroetsch poem.

In their interview with Robert Kroetsch, in Poets Talk, The University of Alberta Press, 2005, Pauline Bunting and Susan Rudy bring up the role of gender and domesticity in The Sad Phoenician. Rudy says “…once a woman tries to articulate the banal, the everyday, and the ordinary, what she’s articulating in the first instance is its oppressiveness. What she might need to do first is to critique, not celebrate it.”

I didn’t read this interview until long after I’d written the poem, but what I was trying to do with The Sad Phoenician’s Other Woman with the female character in the poem was certainly to celebrate a woman’s freedom to choose her own sexuality but also to poke fun at and play with the dynamic and insanity of sexual relationships between people.

Frankly as a writer and as a woman, I’m tired of hearing about how oppressed I am. I’m not. I do what I want and I say what I want. I always have, but particularly in the form of a poem, I have felt free to play and yes to get things wrong. I make no apologies for playing around with language, breaking rules and fucking around in my work. I am pleased to have the opportunity to do so.

In “Jack Spicer to Frederico Garcia Lorca” in “Poetics of the New American Poetry,”Grove Press, New York, 1973, Jack Spicer said “There’s plenty of fudging that’s allowed in this kind of thing. But the old thing that René Char said, he said that the poet should have a sign on his wall saying, ‘CHEAT AT THIS GAME.’

I love to cheat. What I like about writing poetry is trying to get away with things. I enjoy rebelling against convention and constraints, whether they be grammatical or societal. “The Sad Phoenician’s Other Woman” is one of my attempts at such.

One of the things that I enjoy playing with in the long poem form is the notion of delay.
rob mclennan (& perhaps others) has talked about the long poem as a poetics of delay, which is one of the techniques apparent in Kroetsch’s poems, especially “the Sad Phoenician.” I loved the way Kroetsch used the conjunctions “and” & “but” to cause a disjunction in the narrative and at times to misdirect the flow of the narrative, putting a rock in the river to change the tempo and movement of the water.

What other pieces in the book did I enjoy? All of them, all of them. I can’t give highlights or tell you about what fun i had in “The Winnipeg Zoo” or talk more about the contrasts in tone from one long poem to another. The whole book was one of the most joyful and mind opening experiences with poetry that I have experienced since I began to study contemporary poetry in earnest only five short years ago.

And just when I thought I couldn’t be more excited by Kroetsch’s poetry, when, after my fever broke, I continued to read his works, I discovered “the Hornbooks of Rita K.” (the University of Alberta Press, 2001). The book is written in the voice of Raymond, the intimate friend of the aptly initialled poet Rita Kleinhart, who disappeared from the Museum of Modern Art in Frankfurt, or so Raymond tells us. I loved the way Kroetsch plays with reality here, and the sense of play all the way through.

This is evocative too of Rob Winger’s “Muybridge’s Horse” (Nightwood Editions, 2007), another poem I read before I embarked upon “The Sad Phoencian’s Other Woman”. In his book, Winger also plays with the notion of reality, specifically what is known and documented publically and what may have occurred behind the scenes. This is also what I get from Kroetsch’s work and what I tried to achieve in “The Sad Phoenician’s Other Woman,” to create a world which questions and plays with fact and extrapolation, the effect of opinion and distortion of reality.

As a rank beginner to poetry, I learn by example (actually I’ll always be a beginner and I always hope to learn by reading). I’m only just understanding, thanks to writers like Kroetsch, that it’s possible to write in a voice other than one’s own. The voice(s) in this book open up all kinds of possibilities for what can be done in a poem. Same thing with “the Snowbird Poems” (the University of Alberta Press, 2004). These voices allow the writer to get away with things, he might not otherwise be able to, such as parodies in rhyme form.

What Robert Kroetsch has done for me is that he has given me a gift:

he has opened up my writing to endless possibility of play;

he has made me rethink my recalcitrant perspective on narrative poetry, something I used to avoid at all costs, and find a way to write poetry using devices that I previously thought were only acceptable for fiction;

he has made me want to read other long poems, mentioned and discussed in his brilliant essay “For Play and Entrance: the Canadian Contemporary Long Poem in “The Lovely Treachery of Words, Essays Selected and New (Oxford University Press, 1989);

he has made me want to read and write more.

READINGS: A Guide for Readers & Hosts

2011-06-19T09:44:00.000-04:00

READERS

DO

Promote the reading ahead of time to friends, fans, family, stalkers.
Send organizers your bio and site info.
Rehearse your work.
Find out about how much time you have and stick to it. You should time yourself.
Bring a copy of your bio along in case the host forgets it.
Communicate to the host if you need help with the microphone.
Bring copies of your work to sell.
Let the organizers know about any of your promotional initiatives.
Arrive at least 15 minutes beforehand.
Look up and make contact with the audience members.
Stay for open mics, if they happen.
Be attentive to the other readers’ work.

DON’T

Be late.
Wait til you’re on stage to decide what to read and then fumble thru the pages.
Bring a thick manuscript to the stage. Bring only the work you want to read.
Edit on stage.
Read intros that are longer than the work itself.
Read from an IPhone or any other electronic device. (Your body will turn inward as you squint to read. Scrolling creates annoying delays.)
Tell long, rambling stories.
Heckle other readers.
Mumble.

HOSTS & ORGANIZERS

DO

Provide instructions ahead of time to the readers about time limits, microphone availability, publicity.
Read brief bios.
Ensure there’s a book table for sales.
Promote the reading far and wide.
Ask for help with publicity if you need it.
Introduce the readers & give the audience an opportunity to clap.
Be sure everyone in the room, bar, etc knows about the reading and is told to be quiet.
Make readers feel at ease.
Provide payment of some kind, even if it’s just a free beer.

DON’T

Add or make up anything to the bios to be funny or a wiseass.
Heckle.
Make the reading be about you. It isn’t.
Mumble.

What else?

Upcoming Reading with Ladouceur, Smith, Thomlison & Me!

2011-06-14T16:43:00.004-04:00

Ottawa Small Press Book Fair Pre-Fair Reading
Friday, June 24, 2011, doors 7pm
the Carleton Tavern, 223 Armstrong St.
Amanda Earl, Ben Ladouceur, Jim Smith & Adam Thomlison
lovingly hosted by rob mclennan & presented by span-o (the small press action network-ottawa)

i'll be reading from a work in progress, ghazals against the gradual demise.
would be lovely to see you there.

also, do check the bywords.ca calendar of events for more readings happening that week. there are two on Thursday, for starters.

then come out to the Ottawa Small Press Book Fair on Saturday, June 25 at the Jack Purcell Community Centre between noon and 5pm for treasures, good company and chapbooks galore.

the small of July, more excerpts on Moria

2011-06-10T07:13:00.002-04:00

a 25-poem cycle written during rob mclennan's summer workshop of 2008. here are some excerpts in Moria.

Moria is an on-line journal that has been producing experimental poetry since 1998. Its editor is hiker, sailor, poet, teacher and musician, William Allegrezza, who is one of those indispensable mainstays of contemporary literature, publishing poetry that might be unsung if it were not for him.

parts of "the small of July" have been published in Otoliths 18 and are forthcoming in fillingStation.

check out the whole issue of Moria, Volume 13, Nos 1&2. it's brimming with play and panache.

a fictitious summer

2011-06-06T11:30:00.002-04:00

summertime & the living is not lazy exactly but for my part, more contemplative. i am less interested in attending readings & more interested in writing/reading. & what i am writing/reading more these days is fiction.

currently reading: Ten Thousand Lovers – Edeet Ravel (Headline Review, 2007, first published 2003). i am a big fan of Ravel’s, both her fiction for adults and children. this is the first of the Tel Aviv Trilogy. the main character who is a Canadian studying in Isreal, falls for an Israeli interrogator.

recently read:

The God of Small Things – Arundhati Roy (Random House, 1997)
i had to pause over many sentences in this book, so filled with lyricism. i enjoy reading works set in India. my favourite Indian novel is Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy, a thick epic that took me about three months to read one summer, very entertaining and full of detail about India from the time of partition and onwards, but mostly the story of a woman’s attempts to fend off her parents’ plans to set up an arranged marriage for her. very excited to hear he is writing a sequel. and just recently i read the short story collection by Clark Blaise, The Meagre Tarmac (Biblioasis, 2011). These are linked stories featuring characters from India who have moved to the USA or Canada. i had the pleasure of hearing Blaise read as part of the Ottawa International Writers Festival.

February – Lisa Moore (House of Anansi, 2009)
Moore is very skilled at creating characters i can care for and the way she depicts the grief of the main character, Helen, is well done. note that three of the books on my recently read list were set in Newfoundland & Labrador. i have enjoyed reading other Newfoundlanders in the past, including Michael Crummey whose book Galore is on my list of books to read, & Michael Winter. i am not so sure about his new book The Death of Donna Whalen, as i am not much into true crime stuff but will give it a try at some point. & despite having enjoyed her reading at the Dusty Owl quite a few years back now, i have not yet read any of Michelle Butler-Hallet's work. so i add her to my list of authors to read.

Annabel – Kathleen Winter (House of Anansi, 2010)
i loved this novel, set in Labrador, about a hermaphrodite child who is turned by the doctors into Wayne. i had compassion for all the characters, particularly for Wayne. the voice of this character is so strong it still resonates even now, months after reading this book. and it was a pleasure to hear Winter read and to meet her at the Plan 99 Reading Series at the Manx recently. i was very interested by her comment that she tends to stuff her work with truth and then puts in a little bit of not true that sounds plausible because it is surrounded by all the true bits. she said that better than i just did. i have always worked the other way around, inventing most of what i write and putting in the occasional true detail. now i might try this method.

The Fetch – Nico Rogers (Brick Books, 2010)
i was enchanted by the stories in this collection, set in Newfoundland with very strong voices. and there’s nothing smarmy or sentimental in the telling. Rogers is a fine storyteller.

The Red Garden – Alice Hoffman (Shaye Areheart Books, 2011)
this is a collection of linked stories about the inhabitants and origins of an American town called Blackwell, Massachusetts. i am a big fan of Hoffman’s writing and these stories were compelling and as always left me wanting more. Hoffman has a way with the fairy tale & with misfit characters the way Anne Tyler used to in such books as Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant and the Accidental Tourist. If you’ve never read her teen book Green Angel, you should.

Sub Rosa – Amber Dawn (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2010)
i loved this book, an urban fairy tale about an alternate world of young prostitutes. it mixes magic with realistic insights about runaways and prostitution. it is in no way heavy-handed. a fascinating, compelling book that i didn’t want to end.

Through Black Spruce – Joseph Boyden (Viking Books, 2008)
loved the voices in this book, the Cree bush pilot and his family. loved the lyricism of the descriptions of nature. not so keen on the story of the missing niece who becomes a model. i enjoyed this novel very much, but preferred Boyden’s first novel Three Day Road.

these are the novels and short story collections i’ve read so far in 2011. on my list is more fiction set in India, more work about misfit and eccentric characters. if you have suggestions, please send them my way.

the main thing i’m looking for in a work of fiction is a compelling and imaginative story with characters i can care about. i want to be transported: into complete fantasy or into different realities than my own or to see aspects of my own reality reflected back by the author in different ways. i’d love to hear from you about your favourite fiction or current fiction that is consuming you. i am also on goodreads.com. & there's even a wish list there...

i have resumed writing fiction myself, but am finding the challenges pretty scary. with poetry i am used to and comfortable with removing much of what i’ve written or recasting it, but not as much as what i imagine i will be doing with fiction this time around. i need to do a lot of writing to get to where i want to be, if that makes sense, or to get to where i suddenly realize i am. i want to be able to tell a compelling story and i want to help readers who find they need to escape for a while be able to do so. nothing more than that. fiction has served me greatly over the past few years, as a form of escape and in recent years, as a way to pass the time with characters who become friends when i have been at home or in the hospital with time on my hands and in need of a distraction.

Two events at the Manx Pub this weekend

2011-05-26T08:03:00.004-04:00

Bywords Cornerstone Fundraiser and Spring Launch
Saturday, May 28 at 5 to 6pm
with music by Jesse Cole and poetry by Emily Falvey, Christian McPherson, Rod Pederson and Dimitra Xidous
Those who give money for Cornerstone will receive a free copy of the spring issue of the Bywords Quarterly Journal and our gratitude.
For more on the event please go to my note over at Local Tourist Ottawa

John Lavery Memorial
Sunday, May 29, 4 to 6pm
an informal gathering of friends and fans of John Lavery
hosted by David O’Meara
a chance to celebrate John and share your memories.
FaceBook Event Listing
A big thank you to David O’Meara and the Manx Pub for holding these events and for their continuing support of literature through Plan 99, a prose & poetry series that has features writers from across Canada that we rarely get a chance to hear in person in a welcoming and writer/reader friendly atmosphere without distractions by big screen tvs and with the benefit of very good beer and scotch.

There are so many things going on in Ottawa this weekend: Glebe Garage Sale, Hintonburg Arts Festival, Race Weekend and probably a myriad of other activities, but I hope if you’re in Ottawa or if you want to be in Ottawa, you’ll stop by the Manx for a few hours on the weekend to support a good cause, hear some great poetry and music and celebrate John Lavery, who influenced and touched the lives of many Ottawa writers and musicians.

Pearl Pirie at Sasquatch, Sunday, May 22, 2011

2011-05-23T20:51:00.003-04:00

On Sunday afternoon Pearl Pirie was the featured reader at the Sasquatch Literary and Arts Performance Series. This series has continued since 1980 but not consistently since the founder Juan O’Neill passed away in 2006. In the past while it has had a hiatus but thanks to host Alastair Larwill it’s been back since April and hopefully will continue. It takes place at the Royal Oak II, 161 Laurier St. East in the basement. Next up is Jim Larwill on June 12 at 2pm.

The series also has an open mic. One of the directors and regulars John Woodsworth read poetry in Russian and English and played his balalaika and sang. I felt like Juan was there, applauding from his spot by the fireplace and asking John for an encore.

Pearl read to a small but attentive audience, primarily from an unpublished manuscript she referred to as the sentences project. The idea came from a workshop exercise for her writers’ group Ruby Tuesdays. Pearl chose to do a variation of Lyn Hejinian’s long autobiographical poem My Life and ended up with a dense manuscript.

"The alternative form that Hejinian uses most frequently is what has come to be called the "new sentence," a form of prose poem composed mainly of sentences that have no clear transitions. The gap created by a text that moves from subject to subject invites the reader to participate, to bring his or her own reading to the text."

I think this fits with what Pearl is doing in this particular work and like Hejinian's open text, Pearl's text is open to the reader.

And this is what Pearl says about the method: “For 20 minutes we did a take-off, picking one year and writing as many sentences as our each. Each sentence was a non-sequitur to the last. It worked well with how I think. I pushed to see how far it would go. In the first burst, about 4600 words long. It was a larger canvas than I usually give myself and by its nature asks to be dense, but not dwell and to build in ways for cross-ties over the length to give some coherence, but not in a direct linear way.”

It is not uncommon for Pearl to use exercises to help in the creation of her work. In her recent collection “been shed bore” (Chaudiere Books) she uses several constraints to create her poems.

What I found about what she read is that it seemed to be a cumulative collection of juxtapositions that resulted in slices of life, kind of like a snakey jigsaw puzzle with much fun word play and a depth of meaning, lyricism and imagery.

You can find an example of the work over at the League of Canadian Poets National Poetry Month blog.

And to read more about the influences for the project, you can visit her blog entry here.

I'll be excited and interested to see this work published.

Stan Rogal Blows Me Away

2011-05-23T11:31:00.002-04:00

Last Friday at the Carleton Tavern, I had the pleasure of hearing a writer I’ve heard tell of, but never heard read before, nor do I recall reading any of his poetry in the past.

Rogal read from his selected Dance, Monster, fresh from Insomniac Press, and some new work, including one very saucy number from an anthology about food.

I wonder how I could have missed this poet. rob mclennan has published Rogal a few times via above/ground press:

#87 In Search of the Emerald City, February 1997 chapbook
#236 Elephant Man, April 2000 broadside

but that was before I got into contemporary poetry and the Ottawa scene, so poof, missed it, missed him. and rob did a 12 or 20 questions interview with him in 2007, which i likely read too but i didn’t search out his poetry at that point either.

i’m not the only one apparently. in his foreword to Dance, Monster, Paul Vermeersch says “For several decades now, Rogal has been writing poetry that has quietly become one of the most entertaining and engaging bodies of work in recent Canadian letters while at the same time developing a reputation, rightly or wrongly (I suspect wrongly), for being what one waggish reviewer called ‘an intellectual redneck.’ I believe this outsider status has contributed to a remarkable poet being largely (but not entirely) overlooked by the Canadian poetry establishment.”

At Friday’s reading, I enjoyed Rogal’s energetic delivery, his irreverence, imagination, word play, syntactic play, humour, sense of fun, straight up mention of body parts and sex, the grotesque and the monstrous, which i found refreshing. There’s an exhilarating pace to his poetry.

Here’s a poem he read on Friday night:

Homespun
after Lorine Niedecker

Nothing new in this, except,
blah blah consolation / no one /
invented the atom. Feeling freakish
among overcomes doing almost anything
good for starey-o-eyed walkmen
sinking static & hiss in the verdant sog
animal wind flushing carp rotting the
nostrilled doorsteps one thing food for
another but, Raleigh sd: “No use going
to the country it will bring us no peace.”
Armed & armoured as we are night air
pumps us pure
mad with oxygen fight drunk to punch
the lights out of unfabulous frog rattlings
homespun communes even eaten alive by no-see-ums.
“The country,” he sd, him standing off
the path nicked of all civilized trappings
sd: “will not,” his naked rack abuzz
with bees sd: “bring us” afraid to move
a muscle, bat an eye, sd: “peace.”

Blah, blah blah…

In Dance, Monster: Fifty Selected Poems, there are poems from eight collections from 1992-2005. Rogal has been a prolific and constantly published writer with fifteen books, including three novels, three story collections and nine poetry collections. And yet, i knew nothing.

Sometimes he’ll hit you with a kapaow opening:

“When someone shouts his love to you / Sew up his lips.” (Labyrinth)

imaginative juxtapositions:

Among the shattered scattered tiger eggs & horsefeathers (Down the Road)

startling imagery:

“As that day, the unholy Grail/looped a scarf around several necks and yanked.” (Riddled)

and much of the book talking about nature, not seeing it as hallowed:

“Nature/Against its will tangles root for root producing/beauty” (Legend)

“Within my grave, ever./Twin shades frozen in unutterable stillness./No solace in a nightingale.” (& the Void Stares Back)

and especially irreverence:

“How make an educated guest among such empty yak?” (Personations 17)

“just one more unlucky bastard left swinging from the scaffold” (Sound the Silent Aitch)

“Herod jacks off between the ecstatic hands of Beata Beatrix while/Salome demands the head of Orpheus and gets it” (More Pricks than Kicks)

“I believe that every hundredth monkey should be made/accountable for its actions./Should supply empirical evidence for motives & long-range plans./ Should be interrogated its brain picked clean of software. / Should be stripped of articles that can be used as weapons.” (Dance, Monster, to My Soft Song)

There’s something plain yet beautiful about Rogal’s writing, a mixture of the lyrical with the irreverent, a lust for life while at the same time not being fooled by its smarminess. I admire that. I don’t want purely cynical poems, nor do I want sentiment. Rogal’s a kind of Frankestein’s monster of a writer, building up body parts and emotions and bits of nature., much like the cover of one of his books, Fabulous Freaks (Coach House Books, 2005), some of which appears in Dance, Monster.

Thanks to rob for another excellent opportunity to hear fine writers. The other readers were Ben Ladouceur and Bruce Taylor who both gave fine readings themselves.

I’ll leave you with one last poem from Stan Rogal. And Ottawans, if he comes back again, and I very much hope he does, don’t miss him.

Love: 1

Often easier spinning straw to gold.
Limiting the body’s adventure to a dark room in a brick tower.
Where dreams are a wrestle with dragons.
Every awakening bolts a sticky must of blood & sap.
Hair grows out of proportion in this place.
A riddle to be climbed by the clumsy hands of youth.
You remember the feeling.
Hard rocks as a matter of course.
Love led around by the nose & no amount of distance forever.
Intaglio of two tiny hearts.
One blind lost in a forest of thorns
the other wandering barefoot in the sand
living hand to mouth the slow unwinding of stars.
Hopeful outgrowing no ancient magic can contain
Or undo.
Her golden tresses brushing darkness from his eyes.

Rant: Death is Certain

2011-05-16T11:37:00.001-04:00

Death is certain. It will happen to me, to you, to everyone you love and everyone you hate, to your dentist, your neighbour, the people you ride the bus with and the woman you buy your coffee from every morning. Death, i repeat, is certain.

So if you aren’t making those you love in your life a priority, if you have yet another excuse as to why you don’t spend time with loves, lovers, friends and interesting, provocative people, then you’re a fool.

After my own close call in November, 2009, i’ve been mostly just grateful to still be alive and confused, often even suffering from a form of grief over how close i came. how come i’m here and others aren’t. how come you are?

Please don’t waste your time in petty squabbles, working late hours on foolish jobs, obsessing over needless details, even doing laundry, if you can be with those you love. Because tomorrow we’ll be gone.

interview with John Lavery, an excerpt

2011-05-10T12:06:00.002-04:00

last summer & fall i had a wonderful on-going e-mail conversation with John Lavery about his fiction and his music. the whole interview can be found in issue 7 of Ottawater.com.

i thought you might enjoy reading this excerpt:

AE: I’m going to switch gears again and talk about another one of your creative activities, your music. At the time of this interview, you’ve been working on a CD to be released with local recording studio Bova Sound. When did you start to play music and write songs? When and why did you decide to share your music?

In your fiction, your characters express philosophies about love, death, politics etc. In your songs, there is an I or an omniscient voice that says things like “”At times, life is, you know, like tennis. Love means nothing.” Or in Ruffian and Geek: “the truth is people come and touch, but have to leave,/and leave a hole inside your head where very stupidly you grieve,”.

I’ve heard you say when you’ve performed that your songs are lies, but audiences have a tendency to take the I as the authorial I, particularly in songs. Do you find this disconcerting or comforting? Is it sometimes more comfortable to reveal a truth or a personal sentiment in fiction than it is in music or the opposite?

JL: The first song I wrote was entitled, “Won’t You Come Along With Me.” You can stop laughing now. I was 13 or 14. Walter Gordon, of “Walter and I,” still remembers it and some of the lyrics, unfortunately. The second was, “It’s Raining Round Me Now.” “It’s raining round me now/the snow is fading into sad tones of grey/the sun has disappeared/to some other land where time and jugglers play/their merry songs and to the green god bow.” As I say, I was 14.

Despite being paralytically shy when I was young, I never had much difficulty digging out my guitar and singing songs when people asked me to, which they did fairly often. Singing is a good way for me to make people disappear.

I believe I said songs were fictions, not lies. It is of the very essence of fiction, perhaps cowardly essence, that it is neither true or false. Of course lies, at times anyway, are less false true than the truth itself.

I remember reading a piece once by Auden in which he talked about being insincerely sincere. Or sincerely insincere. It is never an easy thing, to be sincere. We are linguistic animals, and language is a communicative tool like no other. It is this very fact that makes it difficult for us to accept the inexpressiveness of language, or that there seems always to be a gap between what we say, and what we mean to say. We feel we must not be expressing ourselves correctly, we try again. We try and try.
Of course it is frequently not even a good idea to be sincere. It is almost always dangerous, sometimes very. It can be humiliating, inappropriate, uninteresting, misunderstood.

In a work of fiction, the text is the text, both what is said and, we have no choice but to assume, what was meant to be said. The author is undeniably present in every word, and yet he, or she, can not actually be found anywhere in his or her own fiction. These are the only conditions under which sincerity is possible. Or safe. No money in sincerity, of course. And it takes work. Still, it's an enormous privilege, and absolutely exhilarating, to spit it out at last.

Disappeared en route to Betelgeuse – May 8th 2011 10:22 AM - John Lavery

2011-05-08T16:11:00.002-04:00

Disappearing

which way to the airfield?
tell me can I get there from here?
I'm travelling last class
to Betelgeuse, Deneb, Altair
and points beyond

learn to live without, learn to live within
the motto of the cosmic traveller
sleep tight between the spirit and the skin
make your home the horizon

I'm disappearing
tell me can I get there from here?

I'm ditching my high time,
my single space, and my andro's fear
and I'm moving on

nothing to recall, nothing to declare
the visa of the cosmic traveller
thanks for choosing Labyrinthine Air
we kiss your abyss any new where

we're six-shooting starlings
we're blonde, blue-eyed crows
junkyard swans caked with mud

we can't talk
if you hold me down

white, prairie petrels
we're larks lost at sea
brownbirds of paradise

the word is
when birds die
they fall to the ground

Did you sleep well?
The kitchen's closed,
I don't cook for bed lugs.

Coffee?
It's cold. You'll have to
make some yourself.

John Lavery

----

John passed away this morning. His wife Claire sent me the above lyrics so share with all of you. I wish John well on his journey. Charles and I will miss him.

for those who love colour

2011-05-06T08:09:00.005-04:00

Colour: Travels Through the Paintbox by Victoria Findlay
the first book i ever read specifically about colour. it’s full of wondrous tales about colour in art, fashion, design, health, music, pretty much everything you could imagine. there’s a wee bit of science for the layperson too, explaining how colour works. here is the story of colour from the cave to the canvas, from the indigo workers to the Spanish ox-blood coloured fatty beef stew. this is a collection of fascinating stories.

A Perfect Red: Empire, Espionage and the Quest for the Color of Desire by Amy Butler Greenfield
the history of cochineal, the brightest, strongest red in the world

The Primary Colors: Three Essays by Alexander Theroux
blue, red and yellow in history, art, textiles, literature. love the way this book wanders and takes imaginative leaps from one instance of blue to the next. from eye colour: Hitler’s eyes were blue to a blue vegetable dye made from human urine.

Kandinsky's Concering the Spiritual In Art has a big section on the psychology and theory of colour from 1911.

Pigments Through the Ages
a brief description of the history of specific pigments and their symbolism, often with references to art.

Crayons: Crayola colours

the colour clock represents time as a hexidecimal colour value.

part of my interest in colour comes from my synaesthesia. i have grapheme synaesthesia which means i associate letters, numbers, people's names, days of the week, months and a few other things with colour. for example pain for me can be a green ache, a yellow throb, a white sharp jab and sometimes other colours like brown, purple and red come into play.

Diane Ackerman's A Natural History of the Senses has a great section on synaesthesia; in his memoir Speak, Memory, Nabokov talks about how musical notes evoke textures for him.

Another good book is Blue Cats and Chartreuse Kittens: How Synesthetes Color Their Worlds by Patricia Lynn Duffy.

As a child, i didn't know that i was doing anything unusual when i mixed up colour and names, for example i would sometimes call someone green if their name was Steve. i got 4 and 5 confused because they were blue and green and that seemed similar to me. at some point, i was trotted out at parties and asked to tell people what colour their names were, like a child psychic or carny act. my sister wrote down the correspondences and would test me on them every once in a while and they stayed constant. i've done tests and my synaesthaesia seems to be still very high. if you'd like to do a test, you can take one here.

after being treated a bit like a circus act, i figured i was the only person with this thing, i didn't know it was a condition and i didn't know it could be quite extreme for some people. some people have severe physical reactions to colour or smell or other senses. at 18 in university, i was exposed to Baudelaire's Correspondances and Rimbaud's Voyelles, two poems where senses are blended. Voyelles was particularly exciting for me and confusing. Rimbaud's matches were not my own.

how does this show up in my writing? when i first started to workshop my poems with others, i was told that my colour associations were arbitrary and made no sense. they probably still don't, but it's not something i have heard in the last 5 years or so.

i'm also quite gaga for visual poetry and visual art where colour is prominently featured, such as abstract expressionism, Mark Rothko's pieces.

i found it difficult when i was in hospital due to the lack of colour or the lack of strong colours. everything was white, pale blue, pale yellow. these pale colours were also in my delusions.

if you know of other sites or books on colour or synaesthesia, please let me know. and if you are a colour lover like me, you're a kindred spirit. i'd love to hear more about your colour proclivities.

Wore Down Trust &other fest highlights

2011-05-04T16:12:00.005-04:00

what is it about the writers festival? i start out expecting a good time, some fine readings and a bit of socializing and somewhere along the line, something catches fire with me and i’m under a kind of a spell. any attempts i make to resist purchasing books due to limited finances go out the window.

this year the fire started early with Mike Blouin’s launch of Wore Down Trust, (Pedlar Press), fittingly at the Barley Mow, a local pub in Old Ottawa South near the main festival site of the Mayfair Theatre. there were drinks, there were many drinks and a good crowd. [full disclosure-the author gifted me with a Wore Down Trust t-shirt and i am wearing it right now, which is clearly influencing my fondness for the work]

i admit that i was provoked early on, days before the reading (and i love being provoked) with the promos for the book and an isolated quote from Alden Nowlan on the writers fest site:

oh, admit this, man there’s no point in poetry
if you withhold the truth
once you’ve come by it—

that quote alone makes no sense to me. it comes across as didactic. hackles raised. and then poet Susan Musgrave chose Alden Nowlan’s Selected Poems for her Canada Reads Poetry selection, explaining that Canadians don’t need to be afraid of Nowlan. this irked me even more. i admit i hadn’t read any of Nowlan’s poetry, but i didn’t like the idea of some kind of pandering sycophant with delusions of knowing The Truth. i was bothered enough to take a look at his Selected.

what i read there was not The Truth, but rather brilliant and poignant observations, a wee bit old-fashioned in places, nameless women lying about on the grass, but on the whole beautiful and humble and certainly not didactic. a few poems about the operating room were particularly apt for me and i appreciated the universality of his poetry.

in Wore Down Trust the quote appears along with a few other quotes but it is not in isolation and i think it fits fine, particularly within the context of the three characters Nowlan, Cash and the author himself. in some ways, Blouin’s book reminded me of Rob Winger’s Muybridge’s Horse (Nightwood Editions), another book that plays with public and private personas of historical figures, not as well known as Cash but probably more well known than Nowlan or the author.

Blouin advises us that the voices are imagined and that “most things border the truth.” and this is one of the compelling aspects of Wore Down Trust for me, that exploration of the borders of truth and imagination. the universal truths of trying to live and survive faced with the obstacles inherent in living. the tumult faced by Cash et al in trying to live faced with addictions and sorrows.

as a music junkie and particularly as a lover of the blues, i enjoyed the structure of Wore Down Trust, the three chords AAB repeated throughout, the author as the third bar in traditional blues acts as a kind of anchor, pulls us back to a commonality between the three. “When you can find it, truth sings.” Songs are a form of truth. and yet “We lie to ourselves about who we are.”

there is duende in Blouin’s work here, he evokes the troubles of Cash and Nowlan, their demons not as an outsider, but as someone who can relate to them at least in the persona of the author in this book. “I seem to pick up feelings from everyone else around me.” The book acts as a kind of sampling of heightened emotion and passion without being smarmy.

A [Cash]

The way this is now
I feel almost nothing
that’s a good question I tell the interviewer
don’t even remember what he asked

my tongue is heavy in my mouth
I feel like I’ve been left out to rust
I feel almost nothing

where I am is rattling around inside this body
too tired to care

and the fire continued with other readings at the festival: the House of Anansi poetry bash was excellent. i had a moment during Matt Rader’s reading of A Doctor Pedalled Her Bicycle Over the River Arno where the strength of Rader’s poem and the emotion with which he read it moved me very deeply. i am not one for the idea of perfection in poetry but i recognize the skill of all three readers Sharon Thesen from Oyama Pink Shale, Rader from his book and Ken Babstock from Methodist Hatchet. Babstock’s ability with sound is so brilliant, so much fun. I am a sound junkie.

i don’t know if this has ever happened to you when you’ve attended a reading or read a piece of writing: during Matt Rader’s reading for some reason i felt as if i’d heard something so very good and strong that i found all of my own attempts to write poems passing through my mind and realizing that i wasn’t there, that i hadn’t achieved what i was trying to achieve and perhaps never would. an unsettling and somewhat worrisome thought.

a friend says House of Anansi is Canada’s best literary publisher. i don’t know about that, but they have consistently published some of the most accomplished poetry i've read and these three poets are definitely at the top of their game. and yet they are humble. each of them were nervous readers, especially Matt Rader. i liked that. they weren’t arrogant like some people can be. they didn’t have that horrid I am a Poet attitude (nor did any other poets i heard at the fest, by the way); to share work with people can make the writer feel very vulnerable. some like Rader include autobiography which can be very private to share. Rader is also a skilled soundsmith, which came across beautifully in his reading and in the book. Here’s an example of sound bliss:

Gravity and Grace

The air unravels at Cape Canaveral
and in Oregon a rain-rattle in the gutter
like chariots on cobblestone – Cape
Kennedy, you insist, Canaveral being
a canebrake, a snake able to paralyze
the lungs with its spit of neurotoxin,
a vast tract overtaken by sugarcane.

throughout the book is the subject of sickness and death, a grandfather taken away by ambulance, the discovery of a three-year old child’s body, the sickness and death of a brother. such power and emotion in these poems. what struck me was aspects of ordinary life being mentioned in the context of the experience of dying. and lines that vary from long to short pointed bits of sound, the beauty of these long lines like a requiem for the dead.

Ablution

i.m. S.L.

I.

Because the bathtub was as full of you
As evenings when you washed yourself
And your long blonde hair and brushed
It out before bed, we cleaned carefully,
My young wife and me, on our knees,
As if sponge bathing your absent body.

II.

Before offering a prayer or taking a life
One must be good and of pure condition:
Feet, thighs and inner thighs, the genitals,
Pubic hair, buttocks, belly and breasts,
Right arm, left arm, fingers, fingernails,
Neck, the nostrils, ears, teeth, tongue, hair.

III.

Tonight, when I draw my daughters’ bath,
Brush their hair, their tiny teeth, perform
The evening ritual to prepare for sleep,
The running water runs all the way back
To your brimming body and damp hair
As I held your head to wipe underneath.

IV.

Undress: take the chain from the neck,
The gold from the earls, uncuff the fingers
And arrange the rings like an alphabet
On the bedside table, remove the cotton
That covers the skin, let down the hair:
Brushings will begin with a cedar bough.

V.

Out of the thousands of times I have lain
Naked with my wife, her brown hair falling
Across my face, her thighs open to a page
From the Heroides, I confess to one time
In our early lives when I imagined her
Body was your body moving above me.

VI.

There comes a darkness on the Salish Sea
So modest that when we stand without
Clothes on a moonless beach we cannot
See each other’s bodies and so revealing
That when we enter we see the water
Climax with the white light of basic life.

--

on Sunday there were two poetry events:

Messagio Galore Take VIII with the voices of jwcurry, Alastair Larwill, Grant Wilkins, Christine McNair and special guest Sandra Ridley all working together in various toned harmonies. again perfect for a sound junkie like me. Christine McNair’s Suzy Creamcheese was fun, very fun and the way she breathed, making me need to take some deep breaths, feeling claustrophobic, very disturbing. rob mclennan gives a detailed report here.

the poetry cabaret with Lorna Crozier, Pearl Pirie, Gillian Sze hosted by Sandra Ridley. some of my favourite lines came from Crozier’s memoir. Ridley’s great questions. i’ve already discussed the idea of place in terms of those questions and the answers from the poets.

Robert Pinksy’s masterclass at noon on Monday, his repetitions of some lines from William Carlos Williams “Fine Work with Pitch and Copper” and his description of his poetry process, how he plays with his surroundings and then with the vocabulary used to describe the surroundings, turns words backwards, rearranges them to see what they evoke.

finally the ghazal concert with Sandra Ridley, Lorna Crozier, Rob Winger and Robert Pinsky and the M E L M'RABET Quartet. i especially enjoyed the group readings of classic ghazals and the selection of ghazals from their own work and from the work of others. thanks to Sandra Ridley, who read some of Adrienne Rich’s ghazals, which i now desperately want to read because they seemed to a good counterpoint to the celebrations of nature found in many classic ghazals and instead went to dark places, used long lines and seemed dark. to be frank, they seemed to match the Canadian versions of the form more, particularly John Thompson’s ghazals. and i refuse to call these poems “guzzles”, i don’t care. it sounds icky. but other than that icky word, i enjoyed this ghazal extravaganza and had to end my festival activities there; i was sated.

on sunday night, i skipped the fiction events, came home and watched the Hunter S. Thompson documentary, Gonzo and felt a little less like all the poetry i could ever try to write was going to be weak compared to what i’d heard. it’s not that i want to write like the poets i’ve heard this past week, but that i want my work to be right, not perfect but somehow right. it helped to watch Gonzo. i need to remember that for me writing is an act of rebellion, a way to try and break out of cliché and stock imagery, which i am surrounded by, brainwashed by daily. and in these dark blue political times, i am going to need to write more than ever and read more than ever. i have fallen out of love with my current work. i guess that’s a good thing, but for now i’m disquieted. i’ll need the kind of beauty that i encountered at the ghazal concert and in Sharon Thesen’s work, the edginess and darkness of Sandra Ridley’s poetry, the sound concertos of Pinsky, Pirie and Babstock, the emotion of Rader, the passion of Blouin, the duende. i am open to it all. thank you writers fest for another amazing festival. and thank you to the writers for writing and sharing your work with us readers.

i have said that the Writers Festival should be called the Readers Festival because it is so satisfying for voracious readers like me to get a chance to hear these writers. i think we compromised and decided to call it the WReaders Festival (thanks to Rusty Priske!) i look forward to the fall edition.

the times they are a changin'

2011-05-03T07:01:00.003-04:00

come writers and critics who prophesize with your pen...

this is what i want

universal healthcare
fair treatment for First Nations People
full legalization of sex work for workers & clients
legalization of marriage for multiple consenting adults & ensuing benefits etc
the extension of the word family beyond parents & children to include caregivers, roommates & multiple spouses
women’s reproductive rights, especially the right to choose
green tax incentives to car-free people, apartment dwellers, composters
taxes on heavy polluters
legalization of drugs
more funding for the arts
a fully funded CBC
limitless internet usage
no participation in war of any kind; Canadian military as peacekeepers only
focus on ending hunger, homelessness, poverty, domestic violence in Canada
a leading role on the world stage for environmental and above issues
the end of our participation in the G8/G20s
people above profits
people above power
people above all

i am not centrist, i am not moderate, i am so far left i will not be in any Canadian family portraits anytime soon. there is nothing to look forward to for me in a blue Canada. i am freezing in the cold blue ice of a Conservative majority. i am hoping that the small ray of light coming from Orange energy and the wee stem of green hope coming from Elizabeth May will somehow keep those of us on the left going, but as it stands, this is not my country. this is Harperland and baby, it’s cold outside.

place & out of place at the fest & elsewhere

2011-05-02T08:42:00.004-04:00

one of the overriding themes at the Ottawa International Writers Festival this spring is the subject of place in writing.

at the Prairie Scene literary event the other night David Carpenter
Connie Gault, Alissa York and Dianne Warren discussed place in their writing with Laurie Brown. For three out of four writers, it seemed that that old adage “write what you know”was firmly in place in their writing. Only Connie Gault seemed to suggest that one could write what one imagines. The consensus seemed to be that being part of something, some place and writing about that place strengthened the writing.

At the poetry reading on Sunday with Pearl Pirie, Gillian Sze and Lorna Crozier, hosted by Sandra Ridley, the question of place came up once more, the idea that having a sense of place gave a writer a sense of comfort, but also questioning that comfort, wanting to move towards the edge of things and away from the centre. Sze spoke of feeling in between, being from Manitoba, being the child of immigrants, and now living in Montreal. One poet, Pearl Pirie explained that her work tends to stay away from a specific place. Even her poems about Lanark County tend to be an amalgam of different places and her imagination.

I have to say I related most to what she said on place. Another poet who read this week was Mike Blouin who launched his genre bender, Wore Down Trust. While place was evoked in the characters of the author, Johnny Cash and Alden Nowlen, the sense of placelessness is strong. all three men are drifters, searching for something, possibly the truth, whatever that means.

just before the festival, rob mclennan launched his most recent book, Glengarry, a poetry collection about his roots. nothing utopian about the recollection here either, but still home, a sense of this is where i come from and this is where i’m going.

Monty Reid is doing a series of chapbooks about the garden, not a specific place, although Reid is growing a garden at his new home now, but still a sense of being rooted in the landscape is likely there. or maybe not. i have read but one of these chapbooks so far, from Laurel Reed Books and where the hell is it? lost somewhere on my shelves.

Pearl Pirie’s recent chapbook is Between Stations published by obvious ephiphanies press in Japan and these poems are about trains, or perhaps even “trainness,” evoking that feeling of about to arrive but not quite there yet, not reaching the tangible. poems that were published in Fukushima, yes, that place, of the nuclear plants and tsunami and quake destruction. Japan where survivors must feel devasted, without their homes, families dead.

what will be written about the recent Alabama tornadoes, 300 people killed, many people without homes.

my own writing is not about home, never has been about home. As a child i kept my suitcase packed and i saved money from my allowance starting from the age of 8, money for university and to leave what was supposed to be home.

this week long festival celebration of place and home has made me think of my own writing in terms of that subject. my first published chapbook Eleanor (above/ground press) takes Eleanor from 12th Century Acquitaine and England to current day possibly Ottawa, although never mentioned. in Welcome to Earth (Book Thug) an alien discovers light, water, blood, mud. no specific place mentioned. in Ursula, a limited edition chapbook i published via AngelHousePress, Ursula is a drifter who wanders through urban streets while spouting prophetic visions and believing herself to be Saint Ursula. Kiki, my unpublished long poem is rooted in Montparnasse in the 20s and 30s, set in its cafes and nightclubs and in Kiki’s hometown of Source de la Doix in Burgundy, but Kiki, herself comes across as a drifter, leaving for some small apartment in the wee small hours, not able to sleep, restless.

there is no Shangri-la for me. it is all like this, earthquakes, shadows, the moving dark, the knife edge, the life edge. i once tried to write a narrative love poem about Ottawa and it was abysmal. an abyss. i can enjoy these works that rhapsodize over home, but i can’t understand them, not really. i have had to find home in people not in places. home is the people i love and my own body, my mind. i have to be able to find comfort even when the ground is shaking, even when the wind is blowing the trees rootless. and in literature and art and music, i am not looking for home. i am looking to be shaken.

Here Comes the Ottawa International Writers Festival

2011-04-26T12:34:00.003-04:00

here are the events i’m looking forward to; get thee to the beautifully designed festival site designed by Brian Pirie for all the deets, peeps.

WEDNESDAY

Mike Blouin’s launch of Wore Down Trust. in preparation i am reading Alden Nowlan’s Selected. i’m already very familiar with Johnny Cash and vodka.

THURSDAY

Elizabeth Hay, Alone in the Classroom; i loved Late Nights on Air and this book sounds intriguing. the Citizen had a good review of it in the Sunday Books section. and it concerns happenings in the Ottawa Valley. i like to read about Ottawa.

FRIDAY

The Art of the Short Story with Clark Blaise and John Metcalf. (may have to miss, but hoping). i always enjoy what the festival calls masterclasses. they’re basically one on one talks between host and writer who attempts to impart a few words of advice about writing. i’m not writing short stories these days, but i find all of these instructional and you never know when i might decide to take up the short fiction pencil again. i’m embarrassed to say i’ve never heard of Clark Blaise, another reason to attend.

PRAIRIE SCENE with David Carpenter, Connie Gault, Alissa York. apparently a discussion of place in prairie writing. i would have loved to have seen Robert Kroetsch and Dennis Cooley at this event. read a review of York’s book in the Citizen last weekend and sounded interesting. Fauna i don’t think it is a prairie book though, set in Toronto’s Don Valley. i spent a lot of my childhood hanging around the Riverdale Zoo. i lived off Keele for a few months in my early 20s and wandered the river, the bridges of Toronto and i often write about vagabonds. this is why i’m interested. the others i don’t know about, haven’t heard about. let them sing.

SATURDAY

Coach House Books with Sean Dixon, Suzette Mayr, Helen Guri and Gabe Forman
two poets reading : Guri and Foreman. i don’t know either and i’ve heard a wee bit about Foreman’s book, so we’ll see. and this event takes place at Collected Works, which is so lovely now with all its open space. and for you folks with budget constraints (and don’t we all have them), this event’s free as is the Anansi event happening later.

Michael Winter and Steven Hayward read at the Manx at 5pm, but there’s no way i can get there in time. i will not be late for events and disrupt readings. that’s a rule. plus the next event is back over at Collected Works on Wellington, a wee bit west. i take the bus, i walk, so looks like a stint at a Wellington St. pub between Coach House and Anansi. i’m sad to miss Michael Winter though. i always enjoy his readings at the festival.

House of Anansi Poetry Bash with Sharon Thesen, Matt Rader and Ken Babstock. have never heard Thesen or Rader but have heard great things about both, and Babstock is a festival fav.

SUNDAY

Messagio Galore Take VIII with jwcurry, Christine McNair, Alastair Larwill and Grant Wilkins; had to miss Take VII because i was just out of surgery so am very keen on this one.

Poetry Cabaret with Pearl Pirie, Gillian Sze and Lorna Crozier
after rob’s review, am interested in Sze’s new work. plus i liked Fish Bones. always good to hear my dear friend Pearl read. and another dear friend Sandra Ridley is hosting. i haven’t really engaged with Crozier’s work for many years now, but i credit her with being one of the poets whose works turned me on to contemporary poetry in my mid-30 and made me realize i actually wrote poetry. i’ll be interested to hear her read her latest work. and the Q&A with these four women will be interesting, i’m sure.

i am sad to miss Mike Carey and Andrew Pyper at Plan 99 at the Manx at 5pm. see above. Carey was at the festival last year, i believe. i enjoyed hearing him talk about his graphic comics.

Madeleine Thien, Hisham Matar and Johanna Skibsrud
haven’t read any of these authors in full, but am enjoying Skibsrud’s Late Nights with Wild Cowboys from Gaspereau.

Michael V. Smith, Teju Cole and Timothy Taylor
Smith’s book Cambridge is a favourite of mine. i haven’t heard a thing about his new novel Progress and why is that? his Book Thug book body of text with David Ellingson is great fun and whimsical.

THE VOICE OF POETRY with Robert Pinksy and Stephen Brockwell
another masterclass at the Ottawa Public Library. my copy of Pinksy’s the Sounds of Poetry is dog-eared and for some unknown reason, stained. will i be too embarrassed to bring it in for an inscription? i hope not. i haven’t read any of his poetry, and am not easily impressed by a cartoon rendering on the Simpsons, but i am looking forward to hearing him read and hearing his answers to questions by the brilliant and talented Mr. Stephen Brockwell. on a side note if you haven’t yet read Brockwell’s the Real Made Up, you should get it and read it now.

Joyner’s Dream with Sylvia Tyson
i’m a folkie, i admit it. this book is fiction. um, maybe. and also music by Ms. Tyson. yes, please. i want to grow my hair long again, find someone to sing Four Strong Winds with. i mean wow. Sylvia Tyson.

Ghazal Concert with Lorna Crozier, Rob Winger, Sandra Ridley, Robert Pinksy
when i read excerpts from John Thompson’s Stilt Jack, i was hooked on this form. and then a dear friend sent me his ghazals and i was even more hooked. i’ve read others too and most recently Rob Winger’s the Chimney Stone, which pleased me with its humour, the way he incorporated contemporary stuff, music, icons. so of course now i’m writing my own. wouldn’t miss this one.

i find the writers festival to be a form of school for me. it’s a chance to be immersed in good writing and ask and hear questions about good writing. as a writer, i realize what i should be attending are the political events, the big idea events, but i am lured by fiction and poetry, which are these ideas filtered through the observations and emotions of literature. in literature i find influences of other writers: Hemingway, Baudelaire, Stein, etc. literature is what turns me on.

if you’re a writer and you’re in Ottawa or a voracious reader, don’t miss this festival. passes are available thru the festival site and other places. and on a (more) personal note, this is my first whole body festival experience since before the great health crisis of 2009. when i went last year, i wasn’t in full form yet, still waiting for my surgery and having to deal with issues related to my health, but this year, i’m in fine fettle. i intend to immerse myself. come join me.

Response: the Vaderization of Harper

2011-04-08T08:48:00.003-04:00

The Vaderization of Harper, a recent column by my friend Kate Heartfield of the Ottawa Citizen has been on my mind of late. She suggests in her article that the opposition is resorting to hyperbole and that Harper is not a dangerous, power-mad tyrant. She says--and forgive me for the paraphrase; please read the article yourself—that to call Harper a dictator is to do a disservice to those who live under authoritarian regimes. Her evidence is that she has written critical pieces about Harper and is not in jail.

To take this literally, yes, Kate is right, Harper isn’t a dictator…yet, but consider the direction he and his government is taking. Consider that instead of debating issues where his government is in danger of having allowed for serious atrocities, such as the Afghan detainees issue, he either prorogues Parliament or calls an election.

Consider that for his tough on crime legislation he is planning to pass it within 100 days, including proposed legislation that fell off the order paper when the election was called.

Under his government, the census long form has been taken away. This means that substantiation for community services can come only from word of mouth rather than actual fact. It’s easy then to make a claim for the need for more prisons, which Harper wants.

Kate says that calling Harper a dictator is fearmongering, yet doesn't mention Harper's fearmongering in which he says that if we don't elect his government, we will suffer economic collapse, street crime, etc, etc.

The Harper government muzzles government scientists, and other civil servants. Civil servants must get approval from the government prior to giving interviews or sharing information of any kind. They must use the phrase “the Harper Government” when referring to the government. While other parties have used such terms, the Chretien Government, etc, from what i can find out, they have never dictated that their civil servants and government workers use such. (correct me if i’m wrong).

In this bubble campaign, Conservatives are following a tightly controlled script, in some cases even avoiding public all candidates meetings.

This government has undermined the independence of key agencies such as the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission by firing dissenters and replacing them with proponents of Conservative policy.

The Conservatives want to take away party subsidies to eliminate minority parties such as the Green Party and the NDP who don’t have the support of big industry , such as the Conservatives do. Think oil.

Not letting the public in to its rallies. Checking FaceBook profiles to vet those who don’t support Conservative tenets…

If these aren’t the signs of an impending dictatorship, I don’t know what is. Of course it isn't the same degree of dictatorship that would take place in undemocratic countries, but this is how it starts. He isn’t riding around in an open jeep with a gun strapped to his body, but step by step, Harper is undermining democracy in this country. And I think we need to take that seriously.

the unsung poetry books of 2010

2011-04-05T16:29:00.001-04:00

with no offence intended to the shortlisted for the Lampert, the Lowther, the Griffin, here’s my not at all comprehensive list of 2010 books that should (have) receive(d) more notice and their authors who deserve cash, limos, laurels, groupies and a chance to act like Charlie Sheen on national television…

since i have written a bit about all of these books except a few (which i’ll get to), i’ll just provide the list.

been shed bore by Pearl Pirie (Chaudiere Books)
The Little Seamstress by Phil Hall (Pedlar Press)
Rhapsodomancy by kevin mcpherson eckhoff (Coach House)
Fallout by Sandra Ridley (did receive a Saskatchewan Book Award for publisher Hagios)
The Porcupinity of the Stars by Gary Barwin (Coach House)
The Chimney Stone by Rob Winger (Nightwood Editions)
Wild Horses by rob mclennan (the University of Alberta Press)
R’s Boat by Lisa Robertson (University of California Press-i know, not a Canadian publisher, but i’m including because Robertson is Canadian, dagnabit)
Nox by Anne Carson (New Directions-another non Canadian publisher, but see above, dagnabit.

all of these books surprised me, made me excited about the possibilities of language, image, sound, and whimsy. these books were powerful works of poetry where such emotions as grief, humour, and wonder were prevalent throughout. sometimes i wonder what kind of a world it is when books like these receive such little notice from the literati. and then i don’t. sigh. do yourself a favour. if you haven’t purchased these small jewels, buy them today. and perhaps write a wee review or blog entry about them.

in the meantime, here are virtual prizes for these unsung poetic heroes:
a loving cup, three dozen red roses and a magnum of champagne

without your delicious works, mes chers, i would have to say, why write, why read poetry at all…why bother…you put the O in poetry.

please suggest other poetry books published in 2010 that deserve notice and purchase…

Yet Another Maple Leaf Rag

2011-04-03T06:18:00.001-04:00

Iggy’s eyes go ziggy zaggy.
Forgive me, but i think it’s whacky

to elect a man incapable of looking us in the eye,
a sure sign a crimson promise is nothing but a lie.

Harper with his piercing blue diction
must be a lover of fantasy and science fiction.

He cooks up imaginary crooks who need incarceration,
while ignoring the downtrodden of the nation.

For Jack Layton I have nothing but compassion
but his pipe dreams will lead to uncertainty and inaction.

Et Gilles Duceppe, qui veut du Québec sa souveraineté,
n’est pas du tout digne de notre amitié.

That leave us with Elizabeth May
who would surely save the day (and the planet),

but she’s not allowed to speak.
The so called powers that be have some cheek.

Politics is nothing but a game played by rich old boys.
We Canadians are merely the rag dolls, their neglected toys.

I know we won’t come out of this election smelling like a rose,
but still, I urge you to vote and if you have to, hold your nose.

30+ ways to celebrate National Poetry Month in Ottawa

2011-03-28T10:27:00.008-04:00

dear Ottawans, here's at least one activity a day for you to enjoy in April, which is National Poetry Month. & please add others in the comments section. and many of these activiites are virtual, so if you aren't in Ottawa, you can still enjoy.

1. VISIT www.nationalpoetrymonth.ca for a month’s worth of visual poetry.

2. ATTEND the launch of Err by Shane Rhodes at the Manx Pub, 5pm & Gustave Morin’s presentation on Visual Poetry as part of the A B Series, 7:30pm, Gallery 101 or Capital Slam’s final qualifying show featuring Nathanael Larochette at 7pm, Mercury Lounge.

3. ATTEND the Dusty Owl Reading Series, 5pm, the Carleton Tavern Upstairs to hear the poetry of Blaine Marchand (and the fiction of Gabriella Goliger).

4. VISIT the League of Canadian Poets daily poetry blog for poems about nurturing.

5. PURCHASE a new poetry book from Collected Works, Mother Tongue Books, Perfect Books, Books on Beechwood or Nicholas Hoare Books, especially those published by Chaudiere Books and Buschek Books, Ottawa's poetry publishers.

6. ATTEND a reading at the Ottawa Public Library, Rosemount Branch at 7pm, featuring Ronnie Brown, Blaine Marchand, Craig Poile, and Paul Tyler.

7. LISTEN to Literary Landscapes with David O’Meara at 6:30 pm on CKCU FM. ATTEND a reading of Japanese form poetry at Mother Tongue Books at 7:30pm, featuring Gillian Foss, Mike Montreuil, Claudia Coutu Radmore, Terry Ann Carter, Janick Belleau.

8. ATTEND a reading at Collected Works at 7:30 pm featuring Maureen Hynes, Ruth Pierson, and Patria Rivera.

9. ATTEND Eco Jest Us, a multi-genre prelude to Earth Day featuring poetry of Pearl Pirie and others at Arts Court at 1:30pm, and RAW, a night of poetry and music at the U of Ottawa Alumni Auditorium at 7pm. ATTEND Colin Morton’s day-long workshop on Art and Artifice in poetry at Algonquin College.

10. ATTEND the Sasquatch Reading Series in the Royal Oak II basement at 2pm, featuring Sheila Martindale. SUBMIT poetry to In/Words.

11. SUBSCRIBE to the Bywords Quarterly Journal.

12. ATTEND Voices of Venus at the Umi Café at 7pm for a spoken word feature and open mic; or the Tree Reading Series at 8pm for the open mic and features Gilliam Jerome and Joshua Auerbach.

13. SUBSCRIBE to Arc Poetry Magazine.

14. LISTEN to Literary Landscapes with Kate Hunt on CKCU FM at 6:30pm.

15. SUBMIT poetry to Bywords.ca.

16. ATTEND a reading at RAW Sugar at 4pm, featuring the poetry of Apt. 9 Pressers Monty Reid and Claudia Coutu Radmore, and the prose of Jeremy Hanson-Finger; or a reading at Collected Works by Christian McPherson at 7pm, or a reading at the A B Series at the Mercury Lounge at 7:30pm by Jen Currin and Jonathon Ball.

17. ATTEND a reading by Jen Currin at Gallery 101 as part of the A B Series at 1:30pm, or the Youth Poetry Slam at 2pm at the Bronson Centre, or a reading by David Groulx, Dusty Owl Reading Series, 5pm, the Carleton Tavern Upstairs.

18. EXCHANGE poetry at the In/Words Writers’ Circle at Carleton University at 6pm, and LISTEN to Monday Night Scribes with John Akpata at 10pm.

19. WRITE new poems and share them with others at the Creative Writing Play Date at Mother Tongue Books at 8pm.

20. VISIT rob mclennan’s blog for poetry reviews of contemporary Canadian poetry and more.

21. EXCHANGE poetry at the University of Ottawa Writers’ Circle at 5:30pm.

22. VISIT Pearl Pirie’s Pesbo Journal for musings on poetry and great photos of readings too.

23. WRITE a review of a recent and local poetry book or chapbook for Bywords.ca.

24. BUY gently read poetry books from the Bytown Bookshop.

25. SEE photos of poets who have come to Ottawa on the sites of local photographers Charles Earl and John W. MacDonald.

26. ATTEND a reading at the Ottawa Public Library, Carlingwood Branch at 7pm, featuring Craig Poile, Sandra Ridley, Ronnie R. Brown & Blaine Marchand, or the Tree Reading Series at Arts Court at 8pm for University Night featuring the poetry of Sinaee, Kozak, Ladouceur, DePape.

27. VISIT the blogs of Rusty Priskie, Kevin Matthews and Greg Franklin for spoken word.

28. BUY passes to the spring edition of the Ottawa International Writers Festival, which begins today; LISTEN to Christine McNair on Literary Landscapes on CKCU FM at 6:30pm.

29. BUY chapbooks from Apt. 9 Press, AngelHousePress and above/ground press. VISIT Room 3o2 Books and buy rare poetic ephemera from jwcurry.

30. BORROW contemporary Canadian poetry books from the Ottawa Public Library and visit the Ottawa Room at the Main Branch for wonderful and rare poetry.

As always, visit the Bywords.ca events calendar to find out about the above events and more as they are added, and the bywords.ca news, links, blogs and store.

and above all, what should be obvious, read poetry! (thanks, Grant ;)

5 things literary: Ottawa, Ontario

2011-03-22T17:29:00.003-04:00

the kind folks at Open Book Ontario asked me to list 5 things literary.

here it is with a photo of me taken by Charles.

The Chimney Stone by Rob Winger

2011-03-21T14:31:00.003-04:00

In The Chimney Stone (Nightwood Editions, 2010), Rob Winger constructs taut and rigorous couplets with edge and humour. Ever since John Thompson's Stilt Jack (Anansi, 1978), ghazals have become a popular poetic form with Canadian writers. See Catherine Owen's Shall: Ghazals (Wolsak and Wynn, 2006). See rob mclennan’s discussion of The Chimney Stone and the ghazal.

“The ghazal allows the imagination to move by its own nature; discovering an alien design, illogical and without sense—a chart of the disorderly, against false reason and the tacking together of poor narratives. It is the poem of contrasts, dreams, astonishing leaps. The ghazal has been called ‘drunken and amatory’ and I think it is.”
John Thompson, Stilt Jack, Collected Poems & Translations, edited by Peter Sanger (Goose Lane Editions, 1995)

In The Chimney Stone, Winger departs from the voices of Muybridge’s Horse (Nightwood Editions, 2007) and the tension between public and private persona to adapt a conversational and personal style. (See my ridiculously long rhapsody to Muybridge’s Horse in Ottawater.com 4.0 “Rob Winger’s Shifting Eye” pp132-143)

In the original Persian form, part of the constraint was for poets to address themselves in the final couplets. Winger does this several times in The Chimney Stone, sometimes by first name and sometimes by last name. Sometimes simply as buddy or pal. Sometimes he addresses others and sometimes even the poems themselves: “Poems, I don’t want you : / there’s no salt left on my old, white mountain.” GHAZAL FOR THE SWEETWATER SEA

Many of Winger’s ghazals reference and take titles, lines from other ghazals by Phyllis Webb and John Thompson, and poems, essays, Mark Twain, even an interview with Wayne Gretzky, songs by Bob Dylan, Emmylou Harris, Paul Simon, Johnny Cash, the Pogues, U2 and others. Whole sections are named after albums by Dylan and Harris. It’s no wonder the cover with its brilliant red centrpiece, beautifully designed by Carleton Wilson, replicates a vinyl record album. This book is full of music and especially folk, blues and country music, all of these so effectively integrated into the poems, without jarring the couplets or rising out of the poem.

There is whimsy and humour in the titles, such as Ghazal for the Blonde on Blonde Blues, Ghazal for Gazelles (of course!)—a delightfully playful and earnest poem with an evangelical refrain—
and in the poems themselves, which include bits of lyric beauty but are not reverent and distant.

“Longtail’s orchids and the golden Theravada temple : / a postcard’s beatified bureaucracy.” GHAZAL FOR BANG KRUT

“Hydrangeas in the ditch , pigs in the shit / in Jo’burg, you’re born in a cradle of tin.”
GHAZAL AGAINST PURE REASON

“If there’s an answer, so what? / The lightning’s still three bays away.”
GHAZAL FOR SHEET LIGHTNING

I think what I enjoy most about this form, and Rob Winger does this so successfully, is the feeling that, although the couplets are not linked, they are, very gently linked to one another.

I love the playfulness of The Chimney Stone, the word play, the plays on Rob Winger’s last name, the zany juxtapositions, the questions, the combination of humility and humour:

GHAZAL FOR JARI KURRI

He and I see the game the same way:
the same source, the same lust, the same surgery his mind was capable of.

Finnish sandwich. Flash, the Great One;
at the centre of our lives: this naming.

Carbon and monoxide: the old Detroit perfume.
Everybody take a whiff, on me.

Your best bet’s an accidental trifecta: rye, clever, jackdaw:
there’s no such thing as synonyms.

It’s too late to catch Carter’s homer, Hokusai’s Fuji, Apollo’s thrusters:
why wait for the right Winger to pass?

GHAZAL FOR HARMONY ROAD

We rise from marinas into melodrama.
On the counter, the Macallan’s half-full.

I want to write war novels and drink, sucker-punch the busboy;
which bits of men are worth applause?

Out of ditches, the road rises. Fault lines swell. I lose
my footing:

so give me Alligator Pie, teddy-bear pancakes, an angry branch ticking
the nightmare’s window.

Should I climb right out of the machinery, or dig
in, web, build me some good, frosted fences?

Rich, we’d buy the house on the hill and grow pumpkins:
how many children have we lost to friction?

Pause the traffic and cardinals will come to your feeder:
smeared sand in a shattered mandala.

When the road ends, we’ll plunge
into gravel, find

the old man in the young child,
the alchemist in the engineer.

The bulb needs a vacuum to burn, buddy.
Is this the dark you’ve been looking for?