Poetry

208 letters in canada 1999 MacFarlane, David. Summer Gone. Knopf Canada. 266. $32.95 MacLeod, Alistair. No Great Mischief. McClelland and Stewart. 284. $32.99 Margoshes, Dave. We Who Seek. Black Moss. 106. $17.95 Miller, K.D. Give Me Your Answer. Porcupine's Quill. 246. $18.95 Moir, Rita. Buffalo Jump: A Woman's Travels. Coteau. 160. $12.95 Moritsugu, Kim. Old Flames. Porcupine's Quill. 210. $17.95 Murphy, Sarah. Lilac in Leather. Pedlar. 448. $24.00 Oliva, Peter. The City of Yes. McClelland and Stewart. 336. $21.99 Pullinger, Kate. Weird Sister. McArthur and Company. 308. $21.95 Quarrington, Paul. The Spirit Cabinet. Random House. 342. $32.95 Radu, Kenneth. Strange and Familiar Places. Véhicule. 188. $16.95 Robinson, Eden. Monkey Beach. Knopf Canada. 374. $32.95 Rodgers, Gordon. A Settlement of Memory. Killick. 242. $15.95 Rogal, Stan. The Long Drive Home. Insomniac. 178. $18.99 Sapergia, Barbara. Secrets in Water. Coteau. 432. $16.95 Scott, Gail. My Paris. Mercury. 162. $17.50 Seth, Vikram. An Equal Music. McArthur and Company. 386. $29.95 Simonds, Merilyn. The Lion in the Room Next Door. McClelland and Stewart. 256. $22.99 Skvorecky, Josef. Two Murders in My Double Life. Key Porter. 184. $19.95 Smith, Ray. The Man Who Loved Jane Austen. Porcupine's Quill. 234. $18.95 Stone, Anne. Hugh. Insomniac. 150. $18.95 Thomas, Joan, and Heidi Harms, eds. Turn of the Story: Canadian Short Fiction on the Eve of the Millennium. 280. $22.95 Tulchinsky, Karen X, ed. Hot and Bothered: Short Short Fiction on Lesbian Desire. Arsenal Pulp. 248. $17.95 Vassanji, M.G. Amriika. McClelland and Stewart. 424. $34.99 Walters, Mary. Bitters. NeWest. 266. $20.00 Weaver, Robert, ed. Emergent Voices: CBC Canadian Literary Awards, Stories 1979B1999. Goose Lane. 286. $24.95 Winter, Ray. One Last Good Look. Porcupine's Quill. 178. $16.95 Wright, Eric. Always Give a Penny to a Blind Man: A Memoir. 216. $29.95 Wynveen, Tim. Balloon. Key Porter. 344. $24.95 Zinovich, Jordan. Gabriel Dumont in Paris. University of Alberta Press. 186. $16.95 Poetry MARNIE PARSONS Once upon a time B not in my time, and not in your time, but in old times B there was a man and a woman got married, and they had three children, and they called them Doug, Chris and Marnie. Now Doug and Chris were kind of handy, they could actually do something, but Marnie, she didn't do nothing but sit around all poetry 209 day by the fire and read poetry. She'd take a book from the shelf, crack it open and read it from one end to the other. And that's how Marnie spent her time.* I'm stealing, here, from `Jack Meets the Cat,' a tale told by Mr Pius Power Sr of South East Bight, Placentia Bay, and wackily, brilliantly reimagined by Sheila's Brush Theatre Company. The siblings in the original are Tom, Bill, and Jack. And at first Jack hardly seems the poetry-reading sort. He'd be inclined to sit around in the coal box all day, take a potato, stick it on his big toe, stick it in the fire, roast it, and eat it. But the more poetry I read these past few months, the more I felt Jack tugging on my mind's ear. Not just the pull of distraction and reward B `Psst! when you finish all this poetry, you can dive into Halpert and Widdowson's Folktales of Newfoundland.' (That gorgeous two-volume collection has patiently awaited my eyes for months.) And not just shared experience B Jack, after all, is the youngest of three. And when he set out to seek his fortune, he walked and he walked and he kept on walkin', and he didn't stop walking and he walked some more. He did walk. He did walk. He didn't not walk. He didn't not walk and he walked and he walked till he stopped. He couldn't go another step further. And when I set out on this review, I read and I read and I kept on readin', and I didn't stop reading and...