[jwcurry taking photos of the rainbow (which quickly became a double rainbow) over Hintonberg during a break in the pre-fair reading on Friday] Another
small press fair has come and gone; can you believe we’ve been doing this for
more than two decades now? Here is a small sampling of some of the items I managed
to pick up as part of the festivities:
Kingston ON: The twenty-two
poems that make up the chapbook check
engine. rhinoceros. tungsten. (Puddles of Sky Press, 2015) continues
Michael e. Casteels’ exploration of surrealist prose, lyric narrative and unusual
image combinations, such as in his poems “MY MOTHER, THE FLY,” “A SPECIAL STUDY
OF THE MOOSE” and “TOTALLY COMPULSIVE BEHAVIOUR.”
THE
ROBOT RIDES A BUS
While crossing the
street, a robot is hit by a bus. Small part of the robot roll down a hill,
frayed wires spark, lights flash. The bus driver kneels beside the robot and
cries, “If I had been a surgeon you might have been repaired. If I were a
priest you’d be blessed.” The robot attempts to raise an arm but there is only
the grinding of gears, the leaking of oil. The robot tries to speak but its
voice is garbled and growing faint. Its many lights flicker and dim as silence
envelops the scene. A robot lies in the street. A crowd is gathered. The driver,
still on his knees, cradles the robot’s dented head. The crowd closes in and
hoists the robot to its shoulders. In a short procession they enter the bus. The
driver wipes his eyes with a heavy sleeve, and follows. The door closes. The bus
starts, lurches into gear, and continues down the rolling hills, towards a lake
that is always in the distance.
What
really strikes in this small collection are his short prose pieces, existing as
both prose poem and incredibly dense short story, writing out a compactness
that says everything the story requires in an incredibly small space. It’s
curious to see the subtle, ongoing strains of Stuart Ross’ influence float in,
around and through Casteels’ writing, something that lives just under the skin
of poems that show an increasing curiosity and wit, as well as an increased sharpness
and clarity. With a dozen or more chapbooks under his belt so far, Casteels is
a writer worth paying attention to. Is a first trade collection that far away,
perhaps?
THE
INNER EAR
It’s dark inside my
inner ear. I light a torch to find my way, scorpions scuttling around my feet. The
low, slow howling of wind—the kind that precedes a storm, or in this case a
train—scares my hiccups right out of me. If it were my train I’d be the one shovelling
coal, hauling thousands of turnips through the night.
Ottawa ON: I’ve been
increasingly impressed with the work of Ottawa poet Marilyn Irwin, and the launch
of her fifth chapbook, the blue, blue there (Ottawa ON: Apt. 9 Press, 2015), provided the opportunity to be
reminded of just how much she’s been improving between publications.
creature,
comforts
the 14 gasps up
Gladstone
bends
Sunday sheets
various fibres
lint and old type
a faked stretch
to the left
our limbs
wormed July warm
curled cat
nothing more
empties, overflowing
Irwin’s
poems [see my recent Jacket2 interview with her on such here] explore a series of moments both large and
small in a compact space, pinpointing a level of minutiae that is so often lost
or overlooked, as well as a space one can only describe as increasingly local.
Her work invites comparisons (obvious or otherwise) to similar works by Nelson Ball, Cameron Anstee and Mark Truscott, among others, and the poems in the blue, blue here are quiet and sharp,
insistently present and remarkably calm. Hers are poems that enter the body
through the skin.
one
fish, two fish
I’ve decided to split
myself in two. into. two fish inextricably linked by fishing line. Möbius strip
of soggy contracts, abstinence. if. gill gape. tension binds intrinsic; this is
how waves are made. scream ekes in the confines of padded, cubicle walls. padded
cubicle walls. not padded. walls. through. note the difference.
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