If you want to know what's wrong (or right) with Canadian poetry these days, perhaps start with Killdeer, by Phil Hall, a poet who has ticked a number of CanLit boxes over the years, and now has published a prize-winning work that, depending on where you come down on such things, will doubtless please or repel, you.
A poem for my mother, July 15 When she was dying And I was in a different country I dreamt I was there with her Flying over the ocean very quickly, And arriving in the room like a dream And I was a dream, but the meaning was more Than a dream has – it was a moving over time And land, over water, to get love across Fast enough, to be there, before she died, To lean over the small, huddled figure, In the dark, and without bothering her Even with apologies, and be a kiss in the air, A dream of a kiss, or even less, the thought of one, And when I woke, none of this had happened, She was still far distant, and we had not spoken.
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