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Lost Gospels
by Lorri Neilsen Glenn
London, ON: Brick, 2010
112 pp., $19

Letter Out: Letter In
by Salimah Valiani
Innana, 2009
$19

Lost Gospels is Lorri Neilsen Glenn’s fourth collection of poetry. An award-winning ethnographer and essayist, the Prairie-raised, Halifax-based writer was Poet Laureate for Halifax, N.S., 2005-09.

The new work spelunks into memory – childhood and genealogy, as well as into the wider caverns of history and biography, especially in lyrics wherein Glenn addresses the spirit of the Jewish-French philosopher Simone Weil, whose Christianity mixed Plato with Marx – and a healthy lashing of paganism too. (Given that the late Halifax, N.S-based, Christian philosopher George Grant adored Weil, she should be viewed as the patron saint of Haligonian intellectuals. A once-and-future Haligonian, I confess that I also like her.)
The title poem’s two-line stanzas remind one of ghazals, but are actually narratives about alternative scriptures, such as “the one about Mahalia, rebuked and scorned, or a man named Willie Johnson / blinded at seven, and they sang, oh yes, they raised light from dark water….” Biblical is every instance of love, striving, and death: “Pinned carefully … under the blade of the wiper // against the glass are two brown speckled wings. You see under the feathers / the shield is cracked….”
This first section of Lost Gospels, moving between private memory and political critique, recalls, in style and imagery, the work of Dionne Brand. But the terminal haikus attain the power of aphorism: “When you avoid dark, / you miss the beauty / of chiaroscuro.” The second section, Verge, seems to owe its structure to a sequence in M. NourbeSe Philip’s 1989 collection, She Tries Her Tongue, the Silence Softly Breaks.
Perhaps Glenn’s seeming response to African-Canadian women poets is for her an acknowledgement of the ‘African’ foremother of us all, namely, Lucy, who is the subject of the poem that opens the book’s third section.  A strong lyric here is also simple. “When they are old”: “days weigh like dust / thick on the leaves //of a roadside bloom. / Then: her fingertips, // his skin, the rain’s / soft and trusting tongue.”
The “Songs for Simone” sequence is good. Yet, the choice to address Weil mainly through prose poetry is questionable. True: This approach shows off Weil’s quoted lyricism, but it dulls Glenn’s lyricism in comparison. Arguably, the fourth and fifth sections of Lost Gospels are the finest.
A prime lyric is “Winter Kill”: “The snow sharpens its cold notes on their needles. / To love is to pity: this is the beginning / and the end of all there is // to know. The field is scalloped in drifts, and the deer taken / down by their throats; their ribs, cleaned by claw / and tooth, curve around the weight // of absence. Here is where we teach the spirit / to move into sorrow….” Here is also where Glenn is most beatific, most spiritual, and most scriptural.  Here is the heart of Lost Gospels, which is art that borders on the sacred.

Salimah Valiani’s second collection of poetry, Letter Out: Letter In, also worries the personal and the political.  Born in Calgary, Alberta, and now based in Toronto, the poet has Tanzanian heritage. So her verse addresses the politics of race in a context of official non-racism, as in South Africa (where she has visited), yes, but also in Canada.
Thus, a meal in an upscale, Cape Town restaurant occasions this reflection: “The wine is fine / The pizza: gorgonzola in Africa / But I can’t understand why there isn’t barbed wire / Around the table where I’m sitting….” Closer to home, the poem, “Black History Tour of Halifax, 2008,” points out that “Saint George’s Round Church… / Included a special gallery for the slaves / Complete with shackles to secure them / during the service.”

That was then, but even now, “When you hear of strife / In Sierra Leone today / It is in part conflict / Dating back to late 18th century Halifax.” Valiani’s muse is editorial and didactic, but her sentiments stab and jab. She is Emily Dickinson with a razor at the ready, but she also recalls Maxine Tynes. Valiani does address love, but its sensuality is not divorced from global issues: “green leaves / almost yellow / from sun // body / moist / with grassy heat // ant-kissed skin. // De-toxing / in climate change rays.” Letter Out: Letter In is also a red-letter book.

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