A Poet’s Nanaimo
Seventeen Years
Sarah and I have never lived anywhere for seventeen years, in the same house that is, together or apart, before the house in which we’ve lived in Nanaimo. Now we’re on the move to another home in Nanaimo, about fifteen minutes south of downtown, and I’m thinking of...
Remembering Lee Maracle
So many people passed on in 2021 including many poets and writers we’ve come to love through their work. I so appreciated Lee Maracle’s work in the world and had the honour and delight of working with her during the summer of 1993. Since hearing of Lee’s death on...
Afterlight: In Search of Poetry, History, and Home
We poets had a beautiful tradition at Glenairley in Sooke, B.C. on Friday evenings at our retreats when the Jewish women said prayers and sang songs, lighting candles as sunset approached for the beginning of Shabbos. One of the women was Isa Milman from Victoria,...
Even the Sidewalk Could Tell
I’ve never received a book for review that comes with a box full of edible goodies – not until a recent delivery that is. Alon Ozery’s new book, Even the Sidewalk Could Tell: How I Came Out to My Wife, My Three Children, and the World (Regent Park Publishing, 2021)...
Modern Day Magic
I look forward to Rachel Lang’s astrology newsletters with her readings for the month ahead so was delighted to hear of her new book: Modern Day Magic: (Hardie Grant Books, 2021). The book is beautifully designed with illustrations throughout and contains “ 8 Simple...
This Strange Visible Air
Sharon Butala’s husband died when she was two weeks short of her sixty-seventh birthday she says in the first essay, “Against Ageism,” in her new book of essays on aging and the writing life: This Strange Visible Air (Freehand Books, 2021). As she was born in 1940,...