Alan and Archibald Sullivan

Poets grow from rivers. Walt Whitman had the Hudson and the Potomac. WC Williams the Passaic. Even Emily Dickinson who, if we believe the rumours, did not get around much had a river that ran to her lover, imagined or otherwise. What’s so big about rivers? They divide space: rive, riven, river. They move through time: the same river twice. And they move toward the unknown. Rivers are a source of creativity, awe, and fear. One need only stand on banks threatening to flood to know the power of rivers.

Our river (Bawating, St. Mary's) is unique, of course. It’s the only natural outflow from the world’s second-largest body of freshwater. And like other rivers, The St. Mary’s has spawned a few poets.

The most famous early Sault poet is remembered more for his adventure novels than for his verse. The oldest son of the area’s second Anglican bishop, Edward Sullivan and wife Frances, Alan Sullivan (1868-1947) was born in Montreal, another river city, but came of age in the Sault. His novels, including The Rapids (1922) which fictionalizes the 1903 Lake Superior Consolidated riots, are rooted in the formative experiences of traveling with his father through the northern diocese. In one collection of poetry Venice and Other Verse (1893), now long out of print, Alan Sullivan recounts a discovery made deep in the woods:


A glade in a forest of beech and oak,
And a hurrying brook, which softly spoke
In ripples and eddies of field and fen,
And haunts unstained by the steps of men:
A little way back from the water’s edge
A great pine clung to a rocky ledge,
And flung its shadow athwart a cross
Of rough-hewn wood, half covered in moss:
Here in the peace of the deep woods’ breast
A worn old huntsman takes his rest,
With naught but the wash of the wandering stream,
And the sigh of the wind through the maples’ crest,
As the monotone of his endless dream.

“The Trapper’s Death” Alan Sullivan

Is it good poetry? Probably not. Is it important? You bet it is.


The Sault’s poetic heritage is well represented by the Sullivan family. Archibald, the youngest of the Sullivan family, was born in Sault Ste Marie in 1885, making him the city’s first genuine literary export. According to a biography of Archibald in Canadian Singers and Their Songs (1919), “The music of the waters of Lake Superior in their wild rush over the rapids was the first sound to greet his ears” (265). But for all that watery influence, Archibald seems to have been obsessed with flowers not rivers, judging by a series of descriptive horticultural poems. In his short lifetime, he died in New York at the age of 34, Archibald was met with a critical appreciation that had eluded his older brother. Archibald’s poems and short stories were published widely, and for good reason.

Notice the religious imagery and the speaker’s frustration at the social conditions he witnesses in “The Cold Poor”:


High crucified on every winter's night,
Bound to the cross of every wind that blows.
Frost on my lips that leaves a kiss of blue.
And on my head the thorns of driven snows.

Sleep may not lay her hand in that of Pain
Or Hope trail silver gannents through the dust,
For Fate decrees the lines I have to read,
Hell is what is and Heaven but a crust.

This little poem, published in Appleton’s Magazine (1907), juggles Christian imagery, images of winter, and the cruel fact of poverty – not an easy task. It was writing like this that brought an international audience to the works of poet Archibald Sullivan, the Sault’s first literary export.

New Poems

Happy New Year!
This blog has been neglected. I had thought about resolving, not in a new year's kind of way necessarily, to make daily entries but just find too many other fun things to occupy my time. That, and nothing I'm up to seems really blog worthy. It may be time to redesign this here thing so that it has a theme. Any suggestions for a theme? Sport socks, perhaps? Flotation devices?

I have been working on some new poems. In fact, they are getting old in that the manuscript was completed in August, 2010. I've let it sit around for five months (although it's also sitting around on the desks of a couple of editors), and have just begun the latest round of revision. The manuscript has been called _Fancy Clapping_ until now, and retains this title for now.

Here is a reading of a poem from _Fancy Clapping_: "The Screen Behind the Curtain."



Thanks for reading. Keep warm.

Canada's Post-Prorogue Senate Gets Down to Business

When Stephen Harper Prorogued Parliament earlier this year, he took the opportunity to stack the Senate with like-minded Canadians. Check out this bit of legislative razzmatazz from the recently passed (in Senate) Bill S-10. In essence, "those who support this measure support it without quantifiable evidence; it just feels right."
Thank you, newly stacked Senate, for your investment in the prison-industrial economy. It's an investment that is bound to return in kind.

From Bill S-10:
"Those who support mandatory minimum sentences argue, in part, that there can never be positive proof that sentencing policies have an impact on the rate of crime – the variables involved are simply too complex. They contend that mandatory minimum sentences are imposed in any event because society believes in denouncing certain crimes and holding people responsible for them. They argue, in addition, that “common sense” dictates that such sentences have at least some deterrence value, even if it is not possible to prove how much, and that deterrence and denunciation remain very important sentencing principles."

Update: not much happening

Not much has been happening, which is fine. When things start to happen, you never know…

I’ve just dug out my most recent manuscript and have begun some light edits. Right now, it’s with several publishers and the silence is stunning.

I have also started on some new poems. Here comes part of one now:

How To Know

Little should rattle us by now.

We’ve seen rocks

fall to invent the earth

and blurred mysteries

that evade science,

microbes that are poison to us

in a universe made from our thoughts.

And just because we have not

said it out loud,

we’ve seen it all the same,

watched it in the vague moment

before we give to sleep, our eyes

see what the brain

cannot decipher and so

ignores; half the thing forgotten,

half ignored.

***

Anyway, it’s still a baby.

Thanks for reading.

People of the Land, Readings in Thessalon, Ontario

Could not have dreamed up a more beautiful day for a drive to Thessalon, Ontario, to read and play a tune in a church turned cafe and concert hall known as The Auld Kirk. It's a nice place with good sound and gallery space. About 30 people were there.
Some highlights: finally met and heard Lesley Belleau whose Colour of Dried Bones (Kegedonce Press, 2008) I've just ordered. Lesley read from her soon-to-be published novel and it was fabulous. The passages she read described a birth, both the beauty and the terror. She's a writer to watch out for.
The always lovely and talented Rolland Nadjiwon read. Rolland is a pleasure to speak with, funny, positive and wise. His Seven Deer Dancing should be required reading for all young Canadian poets.
Many other readers, too many to recount. I'll try to post some pictures if i come across any.

The Great Giller Shortage

Several interesting repercussions to Johanna Skibsrud's Giller win for her novel The Sentimentalist (Gaspereau, 2009). First, we were witness to a wonderful, human response from a writer that most thought didn't have a chance of winning the prize traditionally claimed by authors from the big corporate houses.

The celebration quickly ended, when the print media and those heavily invested in the mass production of the objects formerly known as books realized that Gaspereau, Skibsrud's publisher, wouldn't be able to keep up to the expected demand. The Toronto Star, projecting from the sales of last year's winner, predicted 75,000 copies would be needed in the first year. Gaspereau, the producers of absolutely gorgeous books, can produce a mere 1,000 hand bound, letterpress (i think letterpress, anyway) copies each week.

This projected shortage has sent consumers, and those who claim to represent the best interests of consumers, into frothing madness. To make matters more complicated, Gaspereau Press has thus far refused all offers from mass printers and publishers for "help." In the corporate world, this sort of independence is threatening. The reasoning is that if the little company can't produce quickly enough to meet the whimsical hunger of the impressionable masses, a big company should move in to make it happen. Really, everyone is pissed that they can't have a slice of the goods.

But it's a ridiculous controversy. Skibsrud spent untold years writing the book, surely readers can wait a few months for a copy. A few days ago, most people had never heard of the book and now, if you believe the popular press (here and here), the future of the humanity depends on getting those books to people.

I'm going to place an order with Gaspereau for The Sentimentalist -- not because the book won a prize, not even because I am dying to read it (although I'm sure it's terrific) -- but because I love books and respect anyone who puts as much love and energy into the creation of books as does Gaspereau Press.

For a spin-free telling of this Can-Lit scandal, check out Rob McLennan's blog, the most rational take I've seen so far.

Readings: Bayliss Public Library

A fun night at the lovely Bayliss Library in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan.
Again, it was a stormy evening. What is it with me and stormy evenings?
The first snow storm of the year, with a sour wind, slammed us on our way to the reading.
Thank you to Susan and Ken, and everyone at the Superior Poetry Cafe for organizing the event.
Photos to follow.

No other news.

Reading Seamus Heaney's Human Chain and Brenda Hillman's Pieces of Air in the Epic. Both are marvelous for different reasons.