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    Implicate Me
    Implicate Me
    Implicate Me
    Ebook164 pages1 hour

    Implicate Me

    By Elana Wolff

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    About this ebook

    The thirty-three authors whose poems appear in this collection are: Jonathan Bennett, Rosemary Blake, Allan Briesmaster, Robin Blackburn, Clara Blackwood, James Clarke, Ron Charach, Margaret Christakos, Antonio D'Alfonso, Christopher Doda, Kate Marshall Flaherty, Keith Garebian, Ellen S. Jaffe, Steven Laird, John B. Lee, Malca Litovitz, Laura Lush, Joseph Maviglia, Steve McOrmond, Merle Nudelman, John O'Neill, John Oughton, Ruth Panofsky, Gianna Patriarca, B.W. Powe, Patria Rivera, Julie Roorda, Stuart Ross, Mary Lou Soutar-Hynes, Adam Sol, Sheila Stewart, Pasquale Verdicchio, and Paul Vermeersch.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherGuernica
    Release dateJan 1, 2010
    ISBN9781550715446
    Implicate Me

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      Book preview

      Implicate Me - Elana Wolff

      ELANA WOLFF

      IMPLICATE ME

       SHORT ESSAYS ON READING CONTEMPORARY POEMS

      ESSAY SERIES 56

      GUERNICA

      Toronto – Buffalo – Lancaster (U.K.)

      2010  

      Contents

      Introduction by Ellen S. Jaffe 

      On Pearl by Ruth Panofsky 

      On Leaf For Claire by Allan Briesmaster 

      On Life in Forest Hill by John Oughton 

      On Strays by Laura Lush 

      On Grounds 5B by Margaret Christakos 

      OnPanick Love: A Prose Poem by Antonio D’Alfonso 

      On of water-boots and doilies by Mary Lou Soutar-Hynes 

      On Friday in Jerusalem, by Adam Sol 

      On streetcar incident 504 by Joseph Maviglia 

      On On the Beach with my Daughter

      by Robin Blackburn 

      On Cannonball by Paul Vermeersch 

      On the leprechaun by Clara Blackwood 

      On One Glimpse is All it Takes by Christopher Doda 

      On The Big Bang by Julie Roorda 

      On Visitation IV by Sheila Stewart 

      On City of My Dreams by Stuart Ross 

      On Hands by Merle Nudelman 

      On Cabanel’s ‘The Birth of Venus’ by Keith Garebian 

      On Ponte Fabricio by Rosemary Blake 

      On Hummingbird by Malca Litovitz 

      On His Humming by Steve McOrmond 

      On Chelmsford Avenue by Jonathan Bennett 

      On The Summer the Cat by Ellen S. Jaffe 

      On Three Buskers by Ron Charach 

      On Bella by Gianna Patriarca 

      On If I Had an Accent by Steven Laird

      On Fridge by John O’Neill 

      On Every Seven Seconds by John B. Lee 

      On Why I have trouble with so much contemporary verse by B.W. Powe 

      On The River by James Clarke 

      On Cold War, 1957 by Patria Rivera 

      On Tink, by Kate Marshall Flaherty 

      On Gregorian by Pasquale Verdicchio 

      Author’s Afterword 

      Permissions 

      References 

      Acknowledgements 

      Biographies 

      FOR MENACHEM

      Introduction

      The poems and essays collected in this book, Implicate Me: Short Essays on Reading Contemporary Poems, originally appeared over a five-year period (2002-2007) in a column titled How to Approach a Poem, published in Surface & Symbol, the newspaper of the Scarborough Arts Council, Toronto. The title of the column suggests that a poem is not a static, inanimate object, not just words on a page, but a living thing inhabiting a living space; that we can approach a poem as if it were a wary, wild creature in the woods, and it will lead us into surprising places. A writer of poetry herself, Elana Wolff mediates between writer and reader through the medium of the poem, and shows how, by the act of reading a poem, we become implicated in the poetic process. In these essays, she offers the benefit of her experience, her keen ear and eye, heart and mind; she helps her readers travel through the labyrinth of the poem, following threads of language, imagery, and meaning, and leads us out to the other side, ready to read the piece again and yet again.

      I am honoured to write an introduction to this work. As readers will see from the table of contents, I am not wholly impartial or unconnected to the book. I met Elana several years ago through the community of poets and writers in the Greater Toronto Area. In 2005, Elana asked if she could discuss one of my poems – The Summer the Cat – in her column; I said yes with pleasure, and was touched by her reading. She helped me see my own work in a new way that was both respectful and enlightening. Good commentaries often illuminate aspects of a poem or story of which the writer herself was not completely conscious.

      As I read Elana’s Surface & Symbol articles over the years, I always admired her approach to the poems, both those that immediately appealed to me as well as those I found difficult or confusing. I have re-read the essays several times as Elana prepared this collection, and I continue to gain new insight from them. As a writer, I appreciate her awareness of the stylistic nuances that make poems work and of the way form can express content. And I like the way she explains these concepts clearly, to engage the general reader as well as other poets; she demystifies the poem yet still leaves us with a sense of wonder and emotional richness. Elana was first drawn to writing these essays because of the powerful impact of hearing one poem read aloud; she has continued to explore poems from the viewpoint of a writer and a reader, not an academic critic. She is not looking for answers or imposing judgements, but rather, seeks to enter into dialogue with the poem and invites us into this process. These are essays of appreciation, of wrestling with the words and scrutinizing multiple facets of the text. It is sometimes said that a poem, like music and visual art, needs to be felt and experienced before being understood; or even that it need not be understood at all, as if it were magic and understanding would spoil the beauty. However, poems (like other works of art) are not magic tricks: they show us truth as well as beauty; they use words and rhythms of everyday life in non-ordinary ways, and when we can read this language more clearly, we gain insight into a poem’s meaning, and into the skill through which the poet conveys this meaning to the reader.

      As you read this book, keep in mind Elana’s working definition: Poetry is concentrated, creative writing, based in the emotional soul, that tells truths of inner being with particular force, wit, perspicacity, and plangency. Good poems implicate me, draw me in, and I become involved in the craft and creation. As Elana notes, poems touch the emotional soul, which is why they matter to us, and why so many people turn to poetry in times of stress and loss, as well as delight and love. A poem is not only a form of self-expression, it is the writer’s way of bearing witness to the world in which he or she lives, and of sharing in other people’s experiences – the playful and celebratory as well as the painful and chaotic. Thus, poems can help us empathize with each other and discover common, often unanticipated feelings.

      Why collect the newspaper columns into a book? Gathered together, the pieces reverberate and resonate with each other, so that the relationship of poems and essays tells an expanding, interwoven story. We can turn back and forth between the various pieces and look at specific poetic elements in different contexts and expressions. The essays are little gems of prose, tumbled and polished with care, so that every word counts – just as in a good poem. Good poems do not have a shelf-life; both the poems and the commentaries collected here can be read over and over, to deepen the insight and enjoyment. The pieces appear in the chronological order in which they were originally published, so we can see how Elana’s thinking developed over time. In collecting them into one volume, she has been able to reconsider and reshape some of her earlier reflections and give the writings a more unified feel. This is a book you can read from beginning to end, or open at random and discover the pieces that speak to you at a particular time.

      What are the poems that Elana has chosen? They are all by poets living, writing, and/or publishing in the Greater Toronto Area at the turn of the twenty-first century. All thirty-three poets have published at least one book, and although many have achieved distinctions – as can be seen from the biographical notes – few are widely-known. They hail from diverse backgrounds and their poems present a wide range of styles and experiences. The startling variety of subject-matter shows that it is language, craft and form, not content, that turns a piece of writing into a poem. Reading these individual poems as a collection, I am impressed by their vitality, immediacy, and spirit – even when their subject-matter is challenging or fraught. Elana emphasizes a close reading of the text, and lets the text itself move her commentary into broader areas, sometimes elliptically – again, as in a poem.

      Reading poetry can take us into a new world that is not only brave and dangerous but tender, humorous, surprising, caring, and connected. In these poems and their accompanying essays, we find trains and subways, hills and beaches; the streets of Toronto, Jerusalem, Paris, Sydney, Rome, Manila, and Managua; Glenn Gould’s music and Cabanel’s Venus; dogs and coffee, cats and accents; hornets, hummingbirds, brooms and boots; picnics, fridges, bagels and navels – seen and treated in ways that take us to the song and soul of the universe. Elana Wolff ’s essays are a kind of metaphysical tour-guide for these travels of the imagination.

      Ellen S. Jaffe 

      Hamilton, Ontario 

      March, 2008

      Pearl

      Ruth Panofsky

      I heard that during the war

      while aboard one of those trains

      when you could do nothing else

      you threw your four-year-old daughter

      out the window

      Rather than shield her

      on the ride toward death

      you chose otherwise

      to release her into life

      however horrible

      however brief

      On Pearl

      Compression is a poet’s penchant, concentration a poem’s resource. Consider Pearl by Ruth Panofsky. It is composed of two brief stanzas of five and six lines respectively. It ends with the word brief. Brevity characterizes, not only the body of the poem, but also the life of its subject, Pearl, with her daughter. The scope of emotion contained in this frame of fewer than fifty words, however, is huge.

      From the last two words in the first two lines – war

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