Steffi Tad-y, Notes from the Ward

 

You Who The Earth Was For
After Jean Valentine 

You fleeing war, carrying a rooster with your shaky hand.
You trained to pummel, never the first to wince or flinch. 

You who plant their sadness into dirt.
You whose questions have no gentle answers. 

You who cook too close to the stove.
You at the table, missing the one. 

You whose loss comes with wordlessness.
You beside the rubble, out to build again. 

You in the backseat being loved.
You running towards water.

The second full-length collection by Manila, Phillipines-born Vancouver-based poet Steffi Tad-y, following From the Shoreline (Guelph ON: Gordon Hill Press, 2022) [see my review of such here] is Notes from the Ward (Gordon Hill Press, 2025), a book composed, the back cover offers, as a “collection of poetry exploring bipolar disorder and psychotic break through lived experience and a poet’s eye.” Through sharp, first-person lyrics, Tad-y offers a variation on the declarative point-form, providing a precision across difficult subject matter, writing phrases that accumulate across her lyric stretches. The foundation of Tad-y’s lyric clarity holds each line in place, even through descriptions of untethering; a lyric one might hold on to, for dear life. In the poem “Mangroves,” as she writes: “Back in the truck with Dad & Uncle. I tell them how the trees are / skin & sanctuary to the coast, protection against the onslaught / of storms. // My father places his hand on the headrest of my uncle in the / driver seat and says, Families can be mangroves too.”

What holds the collection together as a coherent unit are the dozen numbered title poems throughout, gathering her thoughts in a space that blends both attempting to heal and the challenges of existing in such a physical and mental space. As “Notes from the Ward #3,” a poem subtitled “After Ocean Vuong’s ‘Reasons for Staying’,” begins: “Think of the next thirty years, mother asked. // The magnolia tree at Oben Street still a pleasant memory. // Of the book, black with deep blue letters, music despite my lack / of understanding.” Tad-y offers lyric declarations underneath titles set as umbrellas, suggesting and directing and hinting at the context of lines that blend direct with the indirect; her poems provide a tone of attempting clarity through these poems, these ward-notes, seeking both as documentary and process. While working through Tad-y’s poems, I’m reminded how, in his novel Why Must a Black Writer Write About Sex? (translated by David Homel; Toronto ON: Coach House Press, 1994), Dany Laferrière wrote that he composed his first novel—referencing his debut, How to Make Love to a Negro (Without Getting Tired) (translated by David Homel; Coach House Press, 1987)—“to save his life.” Or, as the poem “Hold on,” set near the end of this new collection, begins:

Everyone has something.

This is yours.