Rob Mclennan is an accomplished poet, having published twelve-trade poetry books in Canada and England previous to this collection aside from his appointment as writer-in- residence at the University of Alberta for the 2007-8 academic year. I came to mclennan (his spelling) neutral; this is my first contact with his work. His latest work, as the title suggests, is to poetically write about the city of Ottawa. He does this by defining and dividing his poetic gesture into several parts, though he always maintains a steady eye on his subject, the city of Ottawa.
Part one is under the heading of "Ottawa poems (blue notes)."
In this section we get a series of poetic snapshots, or Polaroids of Ottawa. The poems here deal with the city's history while others focus on the present, as he is after all a full time resident and not a tourist. Clearly, mclennan is on intimate terms with the city. He knows and describes the streets, the seasons and how they colour his experience of the city: "in winter / when dark so long / at night, so cold held tight / her seminal body." The 'her' is the city of Ottawa and what comes before this final, lovely image is an imagining about the stones and quarries used to build the parliament buildings.
The idea of the building and creating of Ottawa is linked in part one to the creation of poetic meaning. Frequently, poems and individual lines in the poems are linked to the geography of Ottawa, its past political figures, the construction and change he sees in the city, or his interest and search for a poetic meaning. In short, the writing about Ottawa in the present parallels the historic building of Ottawa and its past political personages: "I am thinking of the dark line / that hangs on the edge, / queen elizabeth drive ... a cadence suggested geographically / from popular burlesque / to question period, / the end of the line, / the rhyme." He knows, however, as a poet that "poetry / & formal history / speaks, but they are / not the same." In other words, poetry and history use a different language to talk about the city, but clearly one informs the other. This duality is also present when it comes to understanding the personas Ottawa shows -- what the poet imagines contrasted with what's seen and experienced by tourists and residents.
If part one is a quest to discover poetic meaning and link it to the very construction of Ottawa (as opposed to the imaginary construction or reflection by the poet) then part two is a direct correspondence, albeit failed according to mclennan, between poetic construction and technique. I am thinking of the section called 'spare moments: seventeen (failed) Ottawa ghazals'. A ghazal, I am happy to inform you (since I too did not know or hear of such a thing till I read this collection) is a lyric poem with a fixed number of verses and repeated rhyme and is found primarily in Middle Eastern and Indian literature or music. I take the title of this section to be ironic -- the poems are a failed success by not clearly following the strict definition of a ghazal. The poems in this section may not rhyme but they demonstrate and work with Zen-like moments of grace and consciousness. Small perfect acts of perception that reminds one of the delicate and precise crafting of haiku:
"... my mutton heart arrows / a hangover of trees
her william tell overtures
the days of cholera & new york magazines
covers..."
mclennan uses an abundance of line lengths and breaks to explore the many different perspectives a city can generate. Thus, the deliberately failed ghazal form is one of the many ways he apprehends the city. The unexpected line breaks and his unconventional use of the comma do not, however, always achieve his purpose of showcasing, presenting and describing Ottawa. Actually, starting a line with a comma seems to do very little other than temporarily distract from what he is saying. Defying convention in this -- granted small and insignificant way -- does little to move the poems forward or to suggest perhaps a more poignant or its opposite, humorous perception. Here is an example from a tender poem called " Shipbuilding:"
'...you ask for the names & the routes
of my former lovers
, these differences
become semantic
,I would rather
lean into a kiss,...'
"Shipbulding" is a wonderful lyric love poem but the comma use just seems to get in the way of its tender expression.
I quibble. This is a very rich collection of poems and its diversity is be noted and celebrated. Ottawa's architecture, streets, history, pubs and markets, the poet's mother and his old apartments all find their place in the Ottawa evoked by mcleannn. One of the many ways we understand a city is by its visual appearance, its history, climate, and its people. To this we must add -- as the Europeans and mcleanan know -- how well the city writes, names, and understands itself through the eyes of its poets.
Carmelo Militano is a Winnipeg poet and writer. His latest book 'The Fate of Olives' (Olive Press, 2007) was short-listed for the Eileen McTavis Sykes book award and recently nominated in Europe for the D.H. Lawrence Travel Book Award.
Canadians have an odd relationship to the U.S. We define ourselves against them, first of all. Many of us in urban centres find guns appalling, our history is closer to compromise than conflict, possibly born out of the need to accommodate both French and English, and the same need has introduced a greater love -- at least in theory -- of diversity, and a recognition diversity is a strength, not a weakness. There is a distinct Canadian identity that Canadians...continue reading
Your second collection of poems, The Cold Panes of Surfaces, is out now. Your first book, Bonfires, won the Canadian Authors Association Poetry Award in 2004. Did winning a national award for your first book bolster your artistic confidence while working on your second, or did you find it daunting, as though you had more to live up to than other poets working on a second collection?
I think it certainly gave me a boost of confidence and the permission I needed to do what I wanted to do artistically with the second book. I didn't feel any outside pressure because of winning the CAA award, or feel that I had any expectations to live up to. Winning the award was terrific, and it was good publicity, but it was also an education on how fleeting such praise can be, and how it leaves your writing life virtually...continue reading