This week on the show, some poetry.Listen
Where once the poet was a prized member of society and honoured, poetry no longer has the high profile it once had, and that’s a shame.
Poems can capture and bring our attention to brief, fleeting moments, tiny vignettes of life, and also explore the greater questions of life, of love, of the human condition.
It is interesting to note that in Canada, a country of 35 million souls, a book of poetry only needs to sell 2,000 copies to be considered a “best-seller”.
Today we’ll meet Philip K Thompson, poet, literary reviewer, and being involved in Canadian literature, with a few other outside jobs to make ends meet.
He currently resides on a island near Petpeswick on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia.
I hope you enjoy our conversation, and should you want a copy of his new book of poetry called “Remember Who You Are, Poems from Petpeswick” write directly
To Goat Rock Press, box 269, Musquodobboit Harbour, Nova Scotia BOJ-2L0
I should point out that the Phil Thompson said the books could be printed much more cheaply in China, but has deliberately chosen to have them printed in Canada to support employment and the economy here.
(theme: composer-performer: M Montgomery (framus guitar)
**Two poems from Philip K Thompson from “ Remember who you are” (Goat Rock Press)
** LIQUID MYSTERY
When I row the old wooden boat,
With distant guidance
From the past
My reference points
Look back:
Triangulate rock, dock, and tower
But when I paddle my kayak
Only the future matters
Look ahead:
The size of waves
Direction of whitecaps
Ice sheets racing
With tidal current
The wind gusts like blue shadows
On grey water with smooth wind lines
That for a path through chaos
This liquid mystery of what comes next
The fading irrelevance
Of my gentle wake
** SHOTGUN POEM
He was a shotgun
Powerful at short range
scattered at a distance
Ideas often missed the target
Wild birds seeking freedom
On tireless heartbeat wings
Whistling through the salt marsh air
But when eye and hand
trigger
the perfect trajectory
he could pull truth down
wounded
from the blood red morning sky
And when love
circles back
To defend her mate
He cannot take aim
or set her free
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