on/meFrancine CunninghamCaitlin Press, 2019 Review by Kim Trainor Let’s start with the title: on/me. Every poem in the collection has two titles: a main title that suggests a general category (On Grief, On Love, On Identity, On Mental Health)...
DREAM FRAGMENTS (Cactus Press, 2020)Mirabel Review by Meggie Royer Mirabel’s DREAM FRAGMENTS reads like one extended descent into sleep––slipping through shadowy corridors and mirrors, grasping for something that may or may not be there. Throughout her pages, the reader...
Less Sweet Than Chocolate or Concrete by Aimee LouwFrog Hollow Press, 2020 Review by Neil Surkan “Crip Poetics is my thesis title / I don’t really know what poetics means.” So ends the penultimate poem in Aimee Louw’s new...
In the Vicinity of RichesChris Hutchinsonicehouse poetry, 2020 Review by Mark Grenon The title of Chris Hutchinson’s fourth book of poetry, In the Vicinity of Riches, suggests that, though the riches of late capitalism may seem to be within...
Divine AnimalBrandon WintWrite Bloody North, 2020 Review by Erin Kirsh Brandon Wint’s inaugural collection, Divine Animal from Write Bloody North, can be described in four words: heavy impact, gentle touch. I first heard Brandon Wint perform poetry at a...
Nothing You Can CarrySusan AlexanderThistledown Press, 2020 Review by Neil Surkan Comprising five suites that echo and amplify one another, Susan Alexander’s sophomore collection, Nothing You Can Carry, pushes us to the limit of hope. Alongside their imagistic flourishes,...
Hearts AmokKevin SpenstAnvil Press, 2020 Review by Robert Colman Kevin Spenst has been inextricably linked to Canada’s small press poetry world for the better part of the past decade. Prior to 2020’s Hearts Amok (Anvil Press) he’d published not...
Designated MournerCatherine OwenECW Press, 2014 Riven Catherine OwenECW Press, 2020 Review by Kim Trainor Last night I went down to the river, the Fraser slipping through Delta’s fingers, past Westham Island, mud-green flow of water tipped silver out to sea....
Mythical ManDavid LyPalimpsest Press, 2020 Review by Hasan Namir There, viper scalesframea smoky-eyed stare––you never know where the gazewill strike David Ly’s debut poetry collection, Mythical Man, opens with the title poem, “Mythical Man I.” The poem, shaped like...