POETRY

this book was one of many in many boxes that i had shipped to my relations in newfoundland from toronto on a skid before leaving the country (canada) for japan back in 2006.  it was the only trace i left behind.  there was a flood in a basement, and my prized books drank up the water and bloomed like cabbages.  today in 2015 i have only a handful of books as i`ve sold, lost, given away most of them due to the stupid habit learned in childhood of moving moving moving. 

i bought this book at a popular used bookstore on bloor street in toronto when i first moved up there, long before knowing i would end up living in PEI for a few months while doing my farming apprenticeship.  i fell in love with PEI that ferry ride over.  (of course we all loved her before from anne of green gables,  and summer pilgrimages to the rainbow valley amusement park.)  the introduction to The Island Means Minago is fantastic, full of  vitriol, piss & vinegar, and real history - the kind we mutter to ourselves through the generations.  I picked up the book `England, England` by Julian Barnes and started it on the train yesterday, and it is in part about the way of viewing a nation as an individual (sort of) and to borrow two words from the back cover, "authenticity" & "nationality".  growing up i elected to take my view of Canada from Canadian poets in the 70s. although i hadn`t been born yet, i`m sure most of our school texts were written then and poetry is the only language i know for the inner world - so it was a good counterbalance to what we were told in no uncertain concrete facts about the giant sprawling landscape around us.

and now a blurry photo of of a photo of milton acorn.