Branches over Ripples

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“Eleonore has gone back out onto the lake, this time in her kayak. Truly no other friend of mine has canoeing more in her blood. She’s practised it since her childhood in northwestern Ontario, and isn’t just a fair-weather paddler; she also likes the challenge  of being on lakes with rains, mists and surging waves. No wonder water imagery runs through so much of her new poetry collection, which is also filled with music and musicians, so the title Wavelengths of Your Song springs naturally from her life and work. After canoeing with its author, you could re-experience the book and wonder how its lines and rhythms were influenced by the dips, strokes, maneuvers and driftings, all the movements of both energy and relaxation, in canoeing around a lake more times than the poet herself can remember.”

 From Brian Bartlett’s Branches over Ripples (Gaspereau Press)

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“Over two years, author and amateur naturalist Brian Bartlett sat down beside various bodies of water (bays, rivers, streams, lakes, waterfalls) to record his impressions, capturing both sensuous details of natural phenomena and reflections on his life and reading. Making a virtue of leisurely digression, Bartlett’s experiment in plein-air writing wanders beyond everyday personal journal-keeping into a meditation on the rich connections between the seemingly disparate experiences of our days, and on the enduring value of indulging our curiosity.”

“Brian Bartlett has published seven collections of poetry (including The Watchmakers Table and Wanting the Day: Selected Poems) and two books of prose (Ringing Here & There: A Nature Calendar and All Manner of Tackle: Living with Poetry). His writing has won numerous prizes, including the Atlantic Poetry Prize, The Malahat Reviews Long Poem Prize and the Acorn-Plantos Award for Peoples Poetry. Bartlett lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he teaches at Saint Marys University.”