As midwinter shows the first hints of spring to come, I’m excitedly awaiting the premiere of Outer Space, Inner Light; I wrote the text in response to a choral score by the amazing Mari Alice Conrad, who wrote that score in response to a different poem, Book of Songs,* which was the title and text…
Category: craftsmanship
Reading the Writing World
I love my career as a writer. There is so much more to it than just sitting down somewhere and writing a poem, a story, a song. There’s a world of research behind the actual creative bits. Some of it is heavy, but a lot of it is joyous. Right now? I’m listening to some…
Free – Graffiti6: Song Review, Years Later
Free running that bass up my spine while Jamie sings, heart in throat and the bells pulling i believe, falling, i believe “…hard to breathe when you’re not near” every one you ever loved walks streets and alleys full of young people seeking something inarticulate “I can’t live, oh, without you” and the city and the…
There is an Onion by the Stove
There is an onion by the stove brown-papered, seeming unconcerned smug, really, if you come to think of its audacious round bum at rest Audacious, to just sit there, by the stove so near the fire, so nonchalant and calm Ha – is there anything more patient? or more self-centred than an onion? …
Helsinki (with recording)
Originally posted on O at the Edges:
? ? Helsinki An editor said never start a poem at a window, so instead I’m looking at the door, which is made of glass. We are to avoid rain, too, but it streaks the pane in such delicious patterns that I can’t help but pretend to be…
Kisses are More Important than Rats
Here’s a first review, from the wonderful Shelley Ann Leedahl. For the Changing Moon review
For the Changing Moon: thoughts on Poems&Songs
My new book is out. The publisher-endorsed launch happened Wednesday, October 24th, 7 PM at Audrey’s Books, with special guests Edmonton’s own Spoken Word Youth Choir, under the direction of the fabulous Gail Sobat. This is book number two, yes, only number two. The long years of discussion and consideration of what it costs to…
Bake Bread, Make Friends – article up at New Trail magazine
This summer, I had the delightful task of researching and writing a little article for my alma mater, University of Alberta. It’s the home page opener at their site, and I couldn’t be more chuffed. Our Daily Bread Now, I’m off to bake bread.
Peach Blossom (after Li Po)
Originally posted on O at the Edges:
Peach Blossom (after Li Po) Ask why I stay on the green mountain and I smile but do not answer; my heart rests. A peach blossom floats downstream – Heaven and earth, apart from this world. ? The transliteration on Chinese-poems.com is as follows: ? Ask me what…
Spirit Mothering
I was 23 when I met my spirit mother. I’d buried my father and my older brother, gone to university, gotten put on probation, answered an ad that seemed the answer to my prayer for something meaningful to do with that year, some path that mattered. The path led to Mexico, to a teaching…
This Cracked Violin
Consider a heart as this cracked violin this instrument of various parts does it matter where it’s from? Not descended from noble European houses, it has not played in Marseilles no craftsman in Italian baroque leaned close and breathed genius into the grain. My fiddle is a metis fiddle but not Metis, not from Red River and…
In Honour Of Lifelong Learning, on this Day of the Dead/Dia de los Muertos
With love to Margaret, and all my many beautiful teachers. You are the Gift. Today, I am an adult. I read, long ago, that Cherokee people count 52 as the age of majority, when one attains to the full rights/responsibilities of adulthood. It resonated with me, the notion that, by 52, one’s had kids (if…
Prairiepomes 