44 Canadian poetry collections to watch for in fall 2024
Here are the Canadian poetry collections we are taking note of in the second half of 2024.
Signal Infinities by Melanie Siebert
Signal Infinities is a long poem following a therapist who observes the personal and collective traumas of young people while at a lakeside apprenticeship. Remarking on the glaciers melting and forests depleting, the poet uses the sensations of the body to describe our connection and relationship to the land and its untenable weather.
Signal Infinities is out now.
Melanie Siebert is the Victoria-based author of Deepwater Vee which was a finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award for Poetry in 2010. Her nonfiction book Heads Up: Changing Minds on Mental Health won the Lane Anderson Award for best science writing for young readers in Canada and was a finalist for the Sheila A. Egoff Children's Literature Prize.
Chambersonic by Oana Avasilichioaei
Through poetry, essays, scores and an ensemble of sound, Chambersonic is a work that transforms the book into an "acoustic chamber". Every aspect of the process of music-making is explored from the conductor to the orchestra as they rehearse and perform. This collection experiments with techniques both musical and poetic.
Chambersonic is out now.
Oana Avasilichioaei is a Montreal poet, performance artist and translator. She has written several poetry collections, including We, Beasts, Limbinal, Operator and Eight Track which was a finalist for the 2020 Governor General's Literary Prize for poetry. She won the 2017 Governor General's Literary Award for translation for the book Readopolis, originally written in French by Bertrand Laverdure.
The Sky Above by Marty Gervais
The Sky Above is a selection of poems from the perspective of a writer who crafts a story in many forms, be it journalism, photography or poetry. Canadian poet Marty Gervais's book tells everyday stories of being a father, weathering storms and occasionally talking to people like Mother Teresa in a Detroit church basement.
The Sky Above is out now.
Gervais is an Ontario journalist, poet, playwright, historian, photographer and editor. In 2018, he was nominated as the City of Windsor's Poet Laureate Emeritus. He is founder of Black Moss Press, one of Canada's oldest literary publishing firms, and is managing editor of The Windsor Review.
The Liturgy of Savage No. 82 by Maya Cousineau Mollen, translated by Adam Haiun
As an Innu woman Maya Cousineau-Mollen grew up outside of the Ekuanitshit (Mingan) community she was born in. In her poetry collection The Liturgy of Savage No. 82, Cousineau-Mollen reflects on connecting with her biological family and culture after being adopted into another family as part of the Sixties Scoop. From childhood and onwards, Cousineau-Mollen's poems bring attention to the complex realities of Indigenous women in Canada and the Indigenous homeless population in Montreal as she draws on her own relationships to identity and systemic racism.
The Liturgy of Savage No. 82 is out now.
Cousineau-Mollen is an Innu poet based in Quebec. Her poetry collection Bréviaire du matricule 082 won the Indigenous Voices Award for French Poetry. Cousineau Mollen also served as an executive assistant to the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.
Adam Haiun is a Montreal-based writer and poet. His work has been published in Filling Station, Carte Blanche, The Headlight Anthology and Bad Nudes. No-Place Grid, his first poetry book, will be published in 2025.
The Double Feature of the Murdered Woman by Carole David, translated by Donald Winkler
As the poet wanders Rome in a 21st century heat-stricken summer, they are faced with the haunted historical streets of Italy. The poet, an Italian once exiled to America, sits watching the titular film of this poetry collection, The Double Feature of the Murdered Woman, meditating on a story of women and violence.
The Double Feature of the Murdered Woman is out now.
Carole David received the Prix Alain-Grandbois in 2011 for her collection Manuel de poétique à l'intention des jeunes filles; the same collection was also included on the shortlist for the Governor General's poetry award. In 2020, she was named the recipient of Quebec's Prix Athanase-David for lifetime achievement in literature.
Donald Winkler is a Montreal-based translator. He has won the Governor General's Literary Award for French-to-English translation for The Lyric Generation: The Life and Times of the Baby-Boomers by François Ricard, Partitia for Glenn Gould by Georges Leroux and The Major Verbs by Pierre Nepveu. Two books translated by him have been shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize: A Secret Between Us by Daniel Poliquin in 2007 and Arvida by Samuel Archibald.
South Side of a Kinless River by Marilyn Dumont
Tackling the way Métis identity has been ignored and suppressed by the nation through poetry, South Side of a Kinless River is a collection focused on the voice of Marilyn Dumont. Closely looking at history, topics such as land loss, midwifery of Indigenous women and the relationships between Indigenous women and European men, the poems of this collection give voice to Métis women, the violence they are subjected to and the knowledge they hold.
South Side of a Kinless River is out now.
Marilyn Dumont is an Edmonton-based poet of Cree Métis descent. Dumont's other works include Green Girl Dreams Mountains, The Pemmican Eaters and A Really Good Brown Girl, is about Dumont coming to understand and embrace her Métis heritage. A Really Good Brown Girl won the 1997 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award.
Breaking Up with the Cobalt Blues by Lindsay Soberano Wilson
Breaking Up with the Cobalt Blues is a collection of poems about recovery from addiction, trauma and domestic violence centred within Toronto's 90s rave culture. Through vulnerable reflections, the poet describes moving through grief and pain and ultimately growing into lightness.
Lindsay Soberano Wilson is a writer, poet and teacher born in Toronto. She is also the author of the poetry collection Hoods of Motherhood.
cop city swagger by Mercedes Eng
In cop city swagger, Mercedes Eng draws on the experiences of racialized and unhoused people in Vancouver, particularly in communities like Chinatown. Through short poems, Eng examines the threat to public safety the Vancouver police posed by assessing cases from 2019 to 2023, highlighting institutional violence and the purpose of community self-preservation.
When you can read it: Sept. 10, 2024
Eng is a Vancovuer prairie-born poet of Chinese and settler descent. She is also the author of Mercenary English. Eng is an assistant professor at Emily Carr University of Art + Design.
The Sky is a Sky in the Sky by Stuart Ross
The Sky is a Sky in the Sky is a collection of miscellaneous poems including one-line poems, prose and a remix of poetry by Stuart Ross's friend Nelson Ball. Infused with humour, this collection imagines the poet's many lives and the grief he endures.
When you can read it: Sept. 10, 2024
Stuart Ross is an Ontario writer, editor and teacher. He is the author of several books of poetry, fiction and essays including You Exist, Pockets and A Sparrow Came Down Resplendent. He won the 2023 Trillium Book Award for his memoir The Book of Grief and Hamburgers.
Interrobang by Mary Dalton
In this collection of exploratory poems, the poet embodies the meaning of Interrobang, a punctuation mark that combines a question mark and an exclamation. Through riddles and playing with form, the poet writes of community, identity and explores what it means to be a "lost soul."
When you can read it: Sept. 12, 2024
St. John's-based Mary Dalton's poetry collections include Merrybegot, Red Ledger, Hooking and Edge. Dalton has won the E.J. Pratt Poetry Award and been shortlisted for various others, among them the Pat Lowther Award, the Atlantic Poetry Award, and the Cogswell Award for Excellence in Poetry.
One River: New and Selected Poems by Ricardo Sternberg
Combining the selected poems of four previous collections in addition to new writings, One River is a collection of exploratory poems in both theme and form. A myriad of otherworldly characters are featured throughout, like a grasshopper or a millionaire entering heaven as a camel and a pilot flying by scent.
When you can read it: Sept. 12, 2024
Ricardo Sternberg is a Toronto-based author and poet. His previous books include The Invention of Honey, Map of Dreams, Bamboo Church, and Some Dance. He is also the author of a book on the Brazilian poet Carlos Drummond de Andrade.
The Flesh of Ice by Garry Gottfriedson
Dedicated to survivors of Kamloops Indian Residential School (KIRS) and all residential schools in Canada The Flesh of Ice is a collection of poems and personal narratives of writer Garry Gottfriedson of the Secwépemc (Shuswap) First Nation. Where Gottfriedson's last collection Bent Back Tongue discussed the history of Indigenous people in Canada as affected by the government of Canada and the Catholic Church, this book describes the lived realities of those who attended KIRS, citing their pain, their resilience and their necessary voices.
When you can read it: Sept. 13, 2024
Gottfriedson is from Kamloops, B.C. He is strongly rooted in his Secwépemc (Shuswap) cultural teachings. In the late 1980s, Gottfriedson studied under Allen Ginsberg, Marianne Faithfull and others at the Naropa Institute in Colorado. He is the author of 13 books, including Skin Like Mine and Clinging to Bone. Gottfriedson received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) in 2023.
Gottfriedson is a juror for the 2024 CBC Poetry Prize.
I Hate Parties by Jes Battis
I Hate Parties is a collection of 50 poems on Jes Battis' experiences of being queer, autistic and nonbinary. Focusing on the feelings of intense anxiety that come with growing up in the nineties in Canada as a marginalized person, Battis writes of adolescence, queer parties and panic attacks through metaphor and honest verse.
When you can read it: Sept. 14, 2024
Battis is a queer autistic writer and teacher at the University of Regina, splitting their time between the prairies and the west coast. They wrote the Occult Special Investigator series and Parallel Parks series. Battis' first novel, Night Child, was shortlisted for the Sunburst Award. Their novel The Winter Knight was on the Canada Reads 2024 longlist.
I Feel That Way Too by jaz papadopoulos
I Feel That Way Too is a reflection on the #MeToo movement and how survivors of sexual assault are further effected by sensationalized trials. Drawing on their own childhood and events like the Jian Ghomeshi trial, the poet turns a critical lens at the sexist structures the media and other social powers uphold. Through these confrontations, this collection of poems meditates on how the bodies of survivors move through these trials and towards healing.
When you can read it: Sept. 14, 2024
jaz papadopoulos is an interdisciplinary writer and educator from B.C. They hold an MFA from the University of British Columbia and are a Lambda Literary Fellow. I Feel That Way Too is their debut poetry collection.
First Here and then Far by David Zieroth
Reflecting on over 50 years of writing First Here and then Far is a collection of David Zieroth's particular poetic voice and identity. From his upbringing in the Prairies to worldwide travels to his current existence in North Vancouver, Zieroth writes of the curiosity that accompanies the every day.
When you can read it: Sept. 14, 2024
David Zieroth is a Vancouver writer. His poetry collection The Fly in Autumn won the 2009 Governor General's Literary Award and was nominated for the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize and the Acorn-Plantos Award for People's Poetry in 2010. Zieroth also won The Dorothy Livesay Poetry Award for How I Joined Humanity at Last. His other works include the trick of staying and leaving, watching for life, the bridge from day to night and Zoo and Crowbar.
Post-Mortem of the Event by Klara du Plessis
Post-Mortem of the Event is a collection of poems and "wave form visualization" composed from recordings of the poet's live readings and digital archives. Hinting at an unwritten manuscript, this collection experiments with form and sound, echoing themes of death and inclusion.
When you can read it: Sept. 15, 2024
Klara du Plessis is a poet, academic and curator living between Montreal and Cape Town. Her other poetry collections include Ekke which won the Pat Lowther Memorial Award in 2019, and Hell Light Flesh which was adapted into a mono-opera at the 2023 International Festival of Films on Art.
Bad Weather Mammals: Poems by Ashley-Elizabeth Best
The poems in Bad Weather Mammals reflect Ashley-Elizabeth Best's own experiences with disability. The poems look back at her childhood, but also her adulthood and even her relationships in her community. The poet explores in a variety of formal constraints both the joys and devastation of living with a disabled body.
When you can read it: Sept. 17, 2024
Ashley-Elizabeth Best is a disabled poet and essayist from Kingston, Ont. Her debut collection of poetry, Slow States of Collapse, was published in 2016. Best's chapbook Alignment was published in 2021. That same year, Best was also a contributor for Resistance, a collection of poems curated and edited by Sue Goyette.
Best was on the longlist for the 2022 CBC Poetry Prize.
Death of Persephone: A Murder by Yvonne Blomer
The poems in Death of Persephone explore the myth of Persephone through the character of Stephanie who lives in a more modern setting than her Greek inspiration. With many displacements to the myth, one question remains: who will survive this altered version of the ancient story?
When you can read it: Sept. 17, 2024
Yvonne Blomer is a poet and author. She is the author of the travel memoir Sugar Ride: Cycling from Hanoi to Kuala Lumpur and the poetry collection As if a Raven. She edited the anthologies Refugium: Poems for the Pacific and Sweet Water: Poems for the Watersheds. Blomer served as Victoria's poet laureate from 2015 to 2018.
Blomer was longlisted for the 2020 CBC Poetry Prize.
Without Beginning or End by Jacqueline Bourque
Inspired by the scenery of her childhood in New Brunswick, Jacqueline Bourque's posthumous poetry collection meditates on life and death after Bourque received a terminal cancer diagnosis. Without Beginning or End offers a series of connections to family, art, friendship and the human condition through short emotional poems.
When you can read it: Sept. 17, 2024
Bourque was an Ottawa-based poet. Her poems appeared in The Antigonish Review, The Dalhousie Review, The Fiddlehead and the Queen's Quarterly. Her first book Repointing the Bricks was shortlisted for the Ottawa Book Award. She died in 2023.
Total Party Kill by Craig Francis Power
Referring to the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) term, Total Party Kill is a scenario within a game of D&D where all of the characters die together. Mapping the poet's personal story of addiction and sobriety alongside a dark fantasy game of monsters and underworlds, this collection combines poetic verse and short monologues. Told through the poet's own voice and other D&D characters, Total Party Kill parallels the roleplaying game and one's path to healing.
When you can read it: Sept. 17, 2024
Craig Francis Power is an artist and writer from St. John's. His first novel, Blood Relatives, won the Percy Janes First Novel Award, the Fresh Fish Award for Emerging Writers, the ReLit Award, and was shortlisted for the BMO Winterset Award. His other books include The Hope and Skeet Love. His visual art has been shown at galleries across Canada.
Water Quality by Cynthia Woodman Kerkham
Water Quality is a book of lamentations, monologues and haibun: a Japanese form of both prose and haiku. Focusing on water as a central force that covers a swimmer's body, the poet follows the movement and purpose of water across lakes, seas and oceans. From Hong Kong to the Pacific Northwest, the poet questions what water wants and how we can best steward it.
When you can read it: Sept. 17, 2024
Cynthia Woodman Kerkham is the Victoria-based author of Good Holding Ground and with feathers and the co-editor of Poems from Planet Earth. Woodman Kerkham was shortlisted for the 2014 CBC Poetry Prize.
Great Silent Ballad by A.F. Moritz
From A.F. Moritz, Great Silent Ballad is a book of seven sections of lyrical poetry ruminating on civilization today and poetry's role within it as a creative medium. The short sections include themes of childhood, how we age and mature and poetry as it relates to feelings of hope, love and freedom.
When you can read it: Sept. 24, 2024
Moritz is the author of 20 poetry collections, including The Garden, As Far As You Know and The Sparrow: Selected Poems. For over a decade he has been the Goldring Professor of the Arts and Society at Victoria University at the University of Toronto, where he continues to teach creative writing. He served as the sixth poet laureate for the City of Toronto from March 2019 to May 2023.
He was a three-time finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award for poetry: for Rest on the Flight into Egypt in 1999, The Sentinel in 2008 and The New Measures in 2012. As Far As You Know was a finalist for the 2020 Ontario Trillium Award. The Sentinel was also the winner of the 2009 Griffin Poetry Prize.
Some Lines of Poetry: From the Notebooks of bpNichol, edited by Derek Beaulieu & Gregory Betts
For what would have been the 80th birthday of Canadian poet bpNichol, Some Lines of Poetry is an offering of 80 pieces of poetry and writing from the late poet's journals. Written in the 1980s, Nichol's notebooks reveal insights to his writing process, on his life and unseen sound and visual poems.
When you can read it: Sept. 24, 2024
bpNichol, who died in 1988, wrote more than 22 books of poetry and prose and won the Governor General's Award for poetry in 1971 and the Three-Day Novel Award in 1982 for Still.
Derek Beaulieu is the author or editor of more than 25 books of poetry, prose and criticism. He has exhibited his visual work across Canada, the United States and Europe. He is currently the director of literary arts at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity and Banff's poet laureate.
Gregory Betts is the author of 10 books of poetry. He is a professor at Brock University and curator of the bpNichol.ca Digital Archive. His most recent book is The Fabulous Op, a collection of poetry co-written with Gary Barwin.
No Signal No Noise by A Jamali Rad
The first book of poetry in The Self-Inscribing Machine series follows Zero the hero after they find a manuscript and are sent on an epic journey across the Muslim world in Sumeria, India and Baghdad. No Signal No Noise experiments with lyric and narrative, drawing on the philosophical, cultural and historical implications of the Self and the Other through one hero's journey.
When you can read it: Sept. 25, 2024
A Jamali Rad is a writer from Iran who now lives in Ottawa. They are also the author of the poetry collection for love and autonomy and still. Jamali Rad also co-founded the small poetry publisher House House Press.
Mondegreen Riffs by Angeline Schellenberg
Informed by the poet's Ignatian spirituality, neurodivergence and trauma, Mondegreen Riffs is a collection that explores the senses. Combining prose poetry, sound poems and answers to "odd online inquiries" this book situates the poet as the listener to the wonders of the world around them.
When you can read it: Sept. 26, 2024
Angeline Schellenberg is the Winnipeg-based author of Tell Them It Was Mozart, winner of the Lansdowne Prize for Poetry and Eileen McTavish Sykes Award for Best First Book. Her poetry collection, Fields of Light and Stone was shortlisted for the 2022 Kobzar Book Award. Schellenberg was the recipient of the 2017 John Hirsch Award for Most Promising Manitoba Writer.
This Report is Strictly Confidential by Elizabeth Ruth
This Report is Strictly Confidential is a poetic memoir of writer Elizabeth Ruth's inner life and family dynamics. Within four sections the poet details the life of her aunt who lived in a government residential hospital and reflects on a father she never met. Through the irony and intimacy of the poet's life, secrets come forward and leave lasting effects.
When you can read it: Sept. 27, 2024
Elizabeth Ruth is an author, poet and professor living in Toronto. She is also the author of the novels Semi-Detached, Ten Good Seconds of Silence, Smoke and Matadora. This Report Is Strictly Confidential is her debut poetry collection.
Hard Electric by Michael Blouin
Michael Blouin's poems in Hard Electric are a collection of reflections with a decided slant toward disaster. They are unsettling, not for the faint of heart, but ultimately also life-affirming for the lonely hearted or those who know them well.
When you can read it: Sept. 30, 2024
Michael Blouin is a writer from Ontario. Blouin won the 2020 ReLit Award for his novel Skin House. He previously won the ReLit Award in 2009 for his debut novel Chase and Haven. Hard Electric is his third poetry collection.
Blouin was a finalist for the 2009 CBC Poetry Prize for his poem fidelity which is included in Hard Electric.
Permission to Settle by Holly Flauto
In a collection of autobiographical poems Permission to Settle highlights the often impersonal and nerve-wracking experiences of immigration processes from applying to moving and then feeling a lack of belonging in your new home. The poet confronts what it means to be a settler in Canada and the colonial structures at work through playful and telling verse.
When you can read it: Sept. 30, 2024
Originally from the USA, Holly Flauto currently lives in Vancouver. Flauto is a writer and poet who teaches English and Creative Writing at Capilano University. Their writing has previously been published in The ex-Puritan, Joyland and The Rusty Toque.
She Falls Again by Rosanna Deerchild
She Falls Again follows the voice of a poet attempting to survive as an Indigenous person in Winnipeg when so many are disappearing. Riddled with uncertainties, like if the crow she speaks to is a trickster, the poet hears the message of the Sky Woman who is set on dismantling the patriarchy. Through short poems and prose this collection calls for reclamation and matriarchal power.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
Rosanna Deerchild has been storytelling for more than 20 years, currently as host of CBC's Unreserved. Deerchild also developed and hosted This Place, a podcast series for CBC Books around the Indigenous anthology This Place: 150 Years Retold. Her book, calling down the sky, is her mother's residential school survivor story. Deerchild is currently based in Winnipeg.
Conversations with the Kagawong River by sophie anne edwards
sophie anne edwards, who is of English and French settler heritage, spent several years with a river on Mnidoo Mnising or Manitoulin Island. edwards immersed herself in the ecosystem, specifically listening to Gaagigewang Ziibi (Kagawong River) and the rhythms of the water, the flora and the fauna. In her poetry collection Conversations with the Kagawong River, she invites the elements of the ecosystem to speak through poetry and explores Mnidoo Mnising | Manitoulin Island Treaty history. This collection reflects on the natural world and settler's colonial relationships to it. edwards' work was supported and reviewed by Anishinaabeg elders and historians on Manitoulin Island.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
edwards is based on Manitoulin Island in Northeastern Ontario. Her writing has been supported by the Canada Council for the Arts. edwards holds a Certificate in Creative Writing from Humber College.
Like a Trophy from the Sun by Jason Heroux
Through moments of joy, nostalgia and surrealism Like a Trophy from the Sun is a collection of prose poems. The poet weaves in the dream world with reality, describing ghost towns and broken sunsets – a book filled with nostalgic humour and poetic fragments.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
Jason Heroux was the Poet Laureate for the City of Kingston from 2019 to 2022. He is the author of four books of poetry: Memoirs of an Alias, Emergency Hallelujah, Natural Capital and Hard Work Cheering Up Sad Machines.
Toxemia by Christine McNair
In this hybrid collection of poems, essays and photographs Christine McNair describes the complexities of living with preeclampsia diagnoses and chronic illness. Toxemia works through the toxicities of the body, physical, mental and societal – ultimately revealing how illness permeates every aspect of one's life from endless appointments, sleepless nights and constant fear of death.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
McNair is the Ottawa-based author of Charm, which won the 2018 Archibald Lampman Award, and Conflict that was a finalist for the City of Ottawa Book Award, the Archibald Lampman Award, and the ReLit Award for Poetry. McNair was also nominated for the Robert Kroetsch Award for Innovative Poetry.
Baby Cerberus by Natasha Ramoutar
Baby Cerberus is a collection of poems switching between classical myth, imagined futures and video games. Exploring fantasy adventures and live realities, the poet invites the reader to consider care and connection in our everyday lives.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
Natasha Ramoutar is a writer of Indo-Guyanese descent from Toronto. Her debut collection of poetry, Bittersweet was shortlisted for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. She is a senior editor with Augur Magazine and serves on the editorial board at Wolsak & Wynn.
echolalia echolalia by Jane Shi
In echolalia echolalia a collection of poems focus on the body politic and the experiences of being queer, disabled and in the diaspora. Reflecting on her own identities, author Jane Shi writes about chosen family and resisting colonial projects and ideologies that seek to dehumanize.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
Jane Shi is a writer and poet based in B.C. Her writing has appeared in the Disability Visibility Blog and Queer Little Nightmares: An Anthology of Monstrous Fiction and Poetry. Shi graduated from the Writer's Studio Online program at Simon Fraser University and StoryStudio Chicago. She is the winner of The Capilano Review's 2022 In(ter)ventions in the Archive Contest.
10:10 by Michael Trussler
In 10:10, the poet juxtaposes the lush beauty of the natural world with the violence and evil realities of the human world today. As a birdwatcher, the poet describes the wonders of animal life through short poems and fragments – questioning why and how such destruction can exist in society alongside such beauty.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
Michael Trussler's previous works include the short fiction collection Encounters and the poetry collection Accidental Animals. His book The History Forest won the Saskatchewan Book Award for Poetry. Trussler's memoir The Sunday Book won the Saskatchewan Book Award in both the Non-Fiction. He is a professor of English at the University of Regina.
Island by Douglas Walbourne-Gough
Following the controversy surrounding the Qalipu First Nation enrolment process, Island speaks to the subjective ways Newfoundland Mi'kmaq cultivate their identities in the wake of colonialism. In fragments, the poet describes the memories, lineages and spiritual ways of reckoning with one's Indigenous identities that go beyond a status card. Memories like resting in nan's sealskin snowsuit or learning the language all contribute to the on-going work of Indigenous people to reclaim the identities and cultures that were once taken from them.
When you can read it: Oct. 1, 2024
Douglas Walbourne-Gough is a poet and mixed/adopted Mi'kmaq from Newfoundland. His debut collection Crow Gulch won the E.J. Pratt Poetry Award and was a finalist for NL Reads, the Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry and the Raymond Souster Award.
Paper Boat: New and Selected Poems: 1961-2023 by Margaret Atwood
Selections from over six decades of legacy of writing, Paper Boat is a volume of Margaret Atwood's quintessential poems from 1961 to 2023. Centring the joys and fears of the poet through mythic and mundane figures alike, this collection remarks on the strangeness of being alive in our complex world.
When you can read it: Oct. 8, 2024
Atwood is a celebrated writer who has published fiction, nonfiction, poetry and comics. She began her writing career with poetry, publishing The Circle Game and winning the Governor General's Literary Award for poetry in the late 1960s. She's since published more than a dozen poetry collections, including The Journals of Susanna Moodie in 1970, Power Politics in 1971 and Dearly in 2020.
She has won several awards for her work including the Governor General's Literary Award, the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Man Booker Prize. Atwood is also a founder of the Griffin Poetry Prize and the Writers' Trust of Canada. She was named a companion to the Order of Canada in 1981. In 2024, she was the recipient of the Writer in the World Prize for her impact on literature, art and culture.
The Middle by Stephen Collis
A collection of poems that disperse words like plants blown and scattered in fields, The Middle is the second book in a trilogy, beginning with A History of the Theories of Rain. The poet confronts the realities of our climate and the displacement that comes with present and on-going disasters like wildfires. Through the concept of "poetic commons" this book meditates on the connections between humans and their environment.
When you can read it: Oct. 15, 2024
Stephen Collis is the author of a dozen books of poetry and prose, including The Commons, On the Material, Once in Blockadia and Almost Islands: Phyllis Webb and the Pursuit of the Unwritten. In 2019, he was awarded the Latner Writers' Trust Poetry Prize, which honours a poet for their body of work. He lives near Vancouver and teaches poetry and poetics at Simon Fraser University.
Walking & Stealing by Stephen Cain
Walking and Stealing is a threefold collection of poems about baseball, Toronto and immersing oneself in deep thoughts. The first section of the book was written in the moments between innings of Stephen Cain's son's little league games. This is followed by two sections: "Intentional walks", or 99 poems walking through Toronto, and "Tag & Run", nine cantos that form a poetic puzzle. In this experimental collection, Cain reflects on culture and space.
When you can read it: Oct. 22, 2024
Stephen Cain is a Toronto-based author of six full-length collections of poetry and a dozen chapbooks, including False Friends, I Can Say Interpellation, Torontology, and dyslexicon. He also published a critical edition of bpNichol's early long poems: bp: beginnings. Cain teaches avant-garde and Canadian literature at York University.
Inside Every Dream a Raging Sea by Liz Worth
Drawing on Liz Worth's experience reading tarot, Inside Every Dream a Raging Sea connects the ritual with the individual. A collection of personal stories of the occult, the poet focuses on our perceptions of self and how to stay connected and open to our lives as we change and grow.
When you can read it: Oct. 22, 2024
Liz Worth is a Hamilton, Ont.-based poet, novelist and nonfiction writer. She is a two-time nominee for the ReLit Award for Poetry for her books The Truth is Told Better This Way and No Work Finished Here: Rewriting Andy Warhol. Her other works also include Treat Me Like Dirt, an in-depth history of southern Ontario's first wave punk movement, Amphetamine Heart, PostApoc and The Mouth is a Coven.
Ox Lost, Snow Deep by Alice Burdick
Ox Lost, Snow Deep includes 14 long poems: part narrative, part surrealism. This collection speaks to the experiences of living in poverty and somewhat in rural communities. Drawing on themes of loss, humour, embarrassment and popular culture, the poet reflects on the public and the personal aspects of life.
When you can read it: Oct. 30, 2024
Alice Burdick is the Nova Scotia author of five books of poetry. Her poems and essays have appeared in multiple anthologies.
In a Tension of Leaves and Binding by Renée M. Sgroi
Speaking through both the poet and the voices of a garden, In a Tension of Leaves and Binding is a collection of nature poems and conversations. Concluding with an essay on the author's process of exploring this garden, this book imagines the characters of the plants and animals as realized voices exploring language and grief.
When you can read it: Nov. 1, 2024
Renée M. Sgroi holds a PhD in Education from the University of Toronto, an M.Sc. in Creativity and Change Leadership from SUNY Buffalo State, and works as a post-secondary educator. She was a runner up in the U.K.'s 2020 erbacce poetry prize and her poetry has been published in numerous journals and anthologies. Sgroi is also a contributing editor to Arc Poetry Magazine.
Dreams of the Epoch & the Rock by Jaspreet Singh
Through dreamscapes and perceptions of our world today, Dream of the Epoch & the Rock is a collection of meditative and urgent poems. Centred on themes of climate, decolonization and language, this book intermingles personal histories and the abstract dreams of ancient gods and ancestors.
When you can read it: Nov. 15, 2024
Jaspreet Singh is the author of the poetry collections November and How to Hold a Pebble, the novels Helium, Chef and Face, the story collection Seventeen Tomatoes, and the memoir My Mother, My Translator. He lives in Calgary.
The Loom by Andy Weaver
The Loom is a collection of lyric poems about the author's experiences after becoming a father of two young boys at age 42. Andy Weaver's life now is filled with restlessness, noise and stickiness with two small children and so this book reflects on his unique journey to parenthood with humour and hard truths.
When you can read it: Nov. 15, 2024
Andy Weaver's poetry collections include Were the Bees, Gangson and This. Weaver is an associate professor of creative writing, contemporary poetry, and poetics at York University in Toronto.
Clarifications
- This post has been updated.Oct 04, 2024 4:34 PM ET
