Interview by Matthew Walsh Jillian Christmas is a powerful force in the spoken word and slam poetry scene. Many of our readers are already familiar with Christmas’s work both in Vancouver and nation-wide. I had the lovely surprise of attending the reading series Chicken Sessions, where...
“If you scan my bookshelves you can pick out the books I gobbled up coming out in the ’80s—the green-spined Virago re-issues of lost women’s classics, the zebra-striped spines of The Women’s Press with the little clothes-iron colophon (so clever! so ironic!) and ‘Steaming ahead...
Arleen Paré if anyone asks tell them I’m sane as stainless steel I heat the pot before I make the tea when the Jehovah’s Witnesses knock I stand stock-still behind the drapes I harden myself against the swords of winter rain against December’s bucket of black night before they hatch I do not...
“There are three books by three different people that I can’t stop recommending. These are the books I read over and over again while writing Davie Street Translations (Talonbooks). The three books being Billeh Nickerson’s The Asthmatic Glassblower (Arsenal Pulp Press), Sina Queyras’...
by Adèle Barclay Mette Bach’s young adult fiction debut, Femme, is a decidedly modern and timely coming-of-age narrative published as part of Lorimer’s SideStreet Series. The series boasts a mandate of publishing edgy and realistic novels for young adult readers. In this vein, Bach offers a...
Jillian Christmas Dear God, Is it wrong that so long after our separation, I still see your face everywhere? The holy water between my legs when she touches me The wet in her eyes, head pressed back, her sinner mouth too full of heaven This bruised knee city Springing with all the wrong...
“Poetry is exploration. Writing, a line springs to mind and I let it lead me through my imagination. As a reader, I willingly follow the path into another poet’s world. And, as a collector of Canadian poetry, I search out books at garage sales, church bazaars, school book sales, thrift shops...
He's got one hand on the wheel and the other on her thigh, and Mae can't quite remember but she's pretty sure this is what love feels like.
“People, listen! The great lessons of philosophy and art and religion are now being reinforced by evidence from science. This may bore the poets of this world but I find it heartening, because the evidence offers a thousand mirrors, reflecting the complex but ultimately altruistic essence of...
