Michael Goodfellow's chapbook, Arrows, was recently released by Laurus Press in Halifax. He graduated from University of King's College in May 2006 and is currently a postgraduate student at the Humber School for Writers. His poetry and criticism has otherwise appeared, or is forthcoming in, Kiss Machine, Softblow, Persuasions: The Jane Austen Journal, and The Dalhousie Review, where he worked from 2005 to 2006.
Stare into Speaking
The dawn is coming - it's only
A warm sun that comes with comfort
And least reality. The cold Sun cannot be focused on now -
You are unable to maintain
Focus through the cool air. The dawn
Breaks night clouds, and becomes fog, and
When the fog clears the clouds float high.
Who but the light can speak all ways,
Know so many ways to describe
The world - the voice to describe and
To change, to cut through the cold.
Who but the dawn can speak to all
Creatures and speak everything at
Once and have already said it.
When the dawn breaks through your window
I am the sun in your room and
All around you, glistening in your
Hair, all around us. Night came. The
Windows in your bedroom were large
And clear. Through the skylight I saw
Every constellation, only
Dots of light. When you ran your hands
Over my fingers, my joints were
Every star point in the sky. When
All you can see are my hands, and
When we're both there under the sky
But only you can see - it's when
Your starburst mouth shines, when I stare
Into speaking, and when you take
My hand and show me, now show me.
The Woods, the Words
I lie all night in pines. The name
Of this forest rhymes with your name.
The forest hums with the sound of
The unseen highway. The highway's
Name is a word I know you have
Known, passed, slipped through. Your name shares none
Of its letters. To find you I
Will study in greater detail,
Through these great trees like green castles,
Or beyond. -It's morning and I
Catch glimpses of you through the light-
Gleamed branches in the distance. Now
I'm running through the woods - the words
I try to turn you around are
The names of trees, the kinds of clouds,
The clothes you wear - but I can't see
Your skin, say your name - you're only
One kind, and I can't turn around.
How the Forest Fire is the Sky
How the sky's distance - the distance
Between us - can be told from fires
Burning, from the sound of flames and
The wind that surrounds them, from a
Bird overhead silent for a
Minute before the wind dies down
And the smoke stops blowing. It won't
Stop burning. In the fire I have
Stared and seen faces and people
I knew. In the clouds I look and
See objects or sheep, and people
Lost in the explosions of air
Crashes. And how it can be all
Of the oxygen can fly sound
Less from tree to fire, from tree
Limb to limb. Or how I'm searching
Everywhere. Not just looking, how
I listen each night for the wind
When the waves come in, and for you,
For the storm that will drown this all.
Ten years ago we worked together at Chapters, and here we are in 2007, both of us with first books published this year. Aside from feeling I'm getting on a bit, I remember a poem of yours where you talk about carrying around The Collected Works of Billy the Kid on your back as though "an extra muscle"; did it help inspire this collection about another historical figure?
Yes, I remember that old poem, too. And, yeah, you're right: Ondaatje's early work made a big impression on me back when I was a wide-eyed, and under-read undergraduate student. I'd never heard of an author re-shuffling or re-inventing history, and had never read a contemporary longpoem before. I'd also never seen an author approach historiography or history as...continue reading
Gleaned from his four previous collections and garnished with more than a dozen new poems, Todd Swift's 'Seaway' is both a 'greatest hits' collection for those who've already read this verbally athletic Canadian-born poet at length and a comprehensive introduction for those on the European side of the Atlantic who have had, so far, only the occasional chance to get a taste of his work at the jostling, competitive buffet known as English language poetry. As such, it is long overdue. Swift, after all, has been a tireless champion of a distinctively cosmopolitan, open-minded, post-modernist strand of contemporary writing for quite some time and his work as an editor and ferociously scrupulous blogger in Budapest, Paris and, latterly, London has all too frequently occluded his reputation as a poet with a singular ability to be simultaneously learned, playful and profound...continue reading