Monday, July 15, 2013

new from above/ground press: The Laurentian Book of Movement by Christine McNair and rob mclennan

The Laurentian Book of Movement
Christine McNair and rob mclennan
$3

The Laurentian Book of Movement
The moths die as soon as I learn their names. I hear nothing from the bats but what the machine tells me. They are sending their best wishes, reminding me to breathe.
        Richard Froude, Fabric

In 1842, Augustin-Norbert Morin walked into the woods. There were only woods.

The forest houses one kind of logic. There is more than one. You called out names under your breath. You stepped out into fleshy rain.

The constellations were in error. We read the sounds of birds.

The skyline, black against the night blue. The first few pages of the weather wrote a thunderstorm. The eaves were full of leaves. Rain water overflowed the porch. We chomped out portions of late summer, reckless portions of Aurora Borealis.

A thread pulls powder across various landmarks. We walk into the Metro. This is not a pilgrimage.

The English language corresponds with optical illusions. One looks too close sometimes, and words begin to shimmer, flick. A chance occurrence, breathes.

There were only woods, north-rolling mountain range a snake across the continent. My mouth full of leaves.

The bed was rich of metal, sleep. I walked into your shoulder.
published in Ottawa by above/ground press
July 2013
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Christine McNair's
work has appeared in sundry places. Her first collection of poetry Conflict was published by BookThug in 2012. Her chapbook notes from a cartywheel was published by AngelHousePress in 2011 and her chapbook pleasantries and other misdemeanours was published by Apt. 9 press in 2013. As a runner-up in the 2013 Battle of the Bards, she has been invited to read at the Toronto International Festival of Authors and was shortlisted for the 2011 Robert Kroetsch Award for Innovative poetry. She works as a book conservator in Ottawa.

The author of more than twenty trade books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, rob mclennan won the John Newlove Poetry Award in 2010, and was longlisted for the CBC Poetry Prize in 2012. His most recent titles include the poetry collection Songs for little sleep, (Obvious Epiphanies, 2012) and a second novel, missing persons (2009). The Uncertainty Principle: stories, is scheduled to appear in spring 2014. He spent the 2007-8 academic year in Edmonton as writer-in-residence at the University of Alberta, and regularly posts reviews, essays, interviews and other notices at robmclennan.blogspot.com

This is the second chapbook from their collaboration-in-progress, after Prelude: selections from a collaboration (above/ground press, 2012).

Produced for a co-featured reading at the In/Words Reading Series, The Clocktower BrewHouse, (downstairs), 575 Bank Street, Ottawa; 9pm, Wednesday July 31, 2013.

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; outside Canada, add $2) to: rob mclennan, 402 McLeod St #3, Ottawa ON K2P 1A6 or paypal at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com

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