“Inspired by beautiful poems from Eleonore Schönmaier (Canada), Giuseppe Ungaretti (Italy) and Gerrit Achterberg (The Netherlands), the musicians show their most sensitive and lyrical side.” CD from One Room Ensemble.
Branches over Ripples
“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 Northern Ontario, and isn’t just a fair-weather paddler; she also likes the challenge and exhilaration of being on lakes during rains, mists and surging waves. No wonder images of water run through so much of her new poetry collection, which is also filled with music and musicians, so the title Wavelengths of Your Song fits perfectly. I’ve read some of the poems two or three times, but it just dawned on me, after canoeing with its author, that you could re-experience the book with the act of canoeing constantly in mind, and wonder how rhythms and lines might’ve been influenced by the dips, strokes, manouverings and driftings, all the movements of both energy and relaxation, in canoeing around a lake again and again.”
From Brian Bartlett’s newly released Branches over Ripples (Gaspereau Press)
“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.”
Oh Canada
When Armand Ruffo, Guest Editor of Arc Poetry Magazine #84, asked me to submit to this special issue I wrote the poem “Afloat.” I’m honoured that my writing is included in #84 along with Louise B. Halfe (Sky Dancer), Gwen Benaway, Jane Munro and Katheryn Wabegijig, among others
“wonder and…wisdom”
Today’s Book of Poetry has reviewed Dust Blown Side of the Journey: “Schönmaier is a perfect mix of Nelson Ball’s wonder and brevity along with the breadth and wisdom, experience and vision of a Lorna Crozier or a Sharon Olds. That is some fine company and Schönmaier is right at home…monstrously good…Reading Dust Blown Side of the Journey is like that first long cool and quenching gulp of fresh spring water after a long hike.”
Poetry is
“If prose is a house, poetry is a man on fire running quite fast through it.” —Anne Carson
Magic Circle of Infinity
Yesterday evening by total chance Bobby Mitchell and I, each of us in different countries, were at the same time working on the New European Ensemble program for Dust Blown Side of the Journey. The planned Den Haag and Amsterdam evenings will include the “Magic Circle of Infinity” by George Crumb and the poem When the crumbs fall (among others).
Summer
I’m working and writing on the edge of the forest. A bluejay keeps me company.
Atlantic Coast
While hiking along Atlantic coastal trails, I’m memorising poems which I’ll recite at the launches for Dust Blown Side of the Journey this week. Also on these walks images for new poems enter my mind. I usually write poems in my head before they find their way to page or screen.
Nocturnes
…hoping sleep will
reach him like a gift
dropped through
the mail slot
like a feather
fallen from a
blue wing…
excerpt from “Nocturnes” from Dust Blown Side of the Journey
When the crumbs fall
into my cage, I taste
Lorca on my lips. why
had I forgotten
the stars? during
all those summers
the water stroked
my skin as I swam
in the night’s mirror
note after note
the stars inked
on the score
sheets of the sky
and when I play
their songs
owls
call me from
the dark opposite
shore
From Dust Blown Side of the Journey (McGill-Queen’s University Press)
