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Momentary Dark
Margaret Avison has long been considered one of Canada’s most respected writers, and in a career that now spans more than forty years, she continues to work at the height of her powers. In this brilliant collection of new poems, Avison writes of our home on this “little rollicking orb,” exhilaratingly situated in the immensity of space, and of life in and out of phase with the divine, the measure of all. Deep, subtle, and wide thinking is couched in a crystalline style, and nobody makes taut sentences more flush with meaning. Momentary Dark is a celebration of the world, but not without edge and a quiet challenge to care for a damaged earth and all its citizens equally, including a veritable populace of city trees graciously and beautifully linking the earth and the sky.
- GenresPoetry
91 pages, Paperback
First published February 28, 2006
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
December 30, 2016
It took a fair amount of effort for me to get into this poetry collection. But I'm glad that I stuck with it. Some of the poetry seemed almost like stream-of-consciousness writing, but perhaps that's because I didn't quite "get" what the author was driving at. I found the second half of the collection more compelling, likely because I could identify with some of the situations and emotions. This Day, In September, and Shelters were a few of my favourite poems. A collection well worth reading, perhaps a little at a time, in between other reads.
January 21, 2022
Is
Humpty Dumpty a
was?
His all-apartity
awash
in royal horses?
(as likely to squash
that goggle-eyed face
in the grass as
to reass-
emble a torso from as
many bits as hash)?
Perhaps poor Humpty had
to tumble so we'd see
all the pieces we need
to make democracy.
* * *
In cruel office shoes
Five o'clock ladies pound
past, toward their release.
(They're homeward bound.)
Where are the office men?
Spoiling their appetites
with snacks (those on the wagon)?
or having "a quick one"?
When the tide's at full spate
some hasten toward the trains
not free to contemplate
coffees, or wines.
Ladies - a metal contrived
and basic order too -
welcome the men they wived.
"Clean-up's for you!"
* * *
On a flat stone, in the
plain light, lies a
torn paper with something written
on it. All the wide shore, the
calm lake, the reeds
listen in the sun, in
silence, as do other flat stones.
Writing to read? for a bird in
transit, or for the
breeze that sometimes stirs when a
motionless midday
passes? No one
is left, writer or some
incurious wanderer now
long gone.
Here is only
peacefulness, and several sunny
flat stones.
* * *
"Muse is a verb, but she
is a lady sometimes, yes?
Musings are intricate, but why
not a lyric next, if you please?"
"Oh very well - if only
the lady muses will deign
to move such an ungainly
ponderous pen as mine."
For a brilliant moment the sun appears,
makes everything look unreal,
turns icicles into chandeliers,
finds mirrors in glass and steel.
Merriment dances in the twigs
as the winds race over the skies
of the noon-hour passersby.
The winter pigeons, toeing in,
veer from a two-year old
who is trotting after to see them run
on their bare pink feet in the cold.
* * *
The bells are celebrating, where? Why
can we scarcely hear? Bemused:
what day is this? O listen!
Hear it: Jubilate.
* * *
The clouds, the morning
sun are such that
one lettuce-bright tree-tip
over the roofs, like me,
is singled out. We are
sun-gilded.
You smile away
out there.
You are I am
inexpert about timing.
How this instant was
hit upon is
beyond us. We in
passing can
only receive
this befalling, a
blassed one.
* * *
Yellow and blue-green young
cottony leaves, in
cloud-shadow and sun, are
four hues over the
wintry rack of branch and tip -
a still becoming form - that summer
trees will enfold fully.
Such blueness in a windy tumbled
sky, and yet so still!
Mist on the lake water is
gashed by an afternoon swimmer;
healing (tiny orblets
of air, resolving welter)
comes even as the
crunch of homebound footsteps
dies away, the towel-draped
swimmer dashing home again
after his icy plunge.
"Laugh before breakfast - tears
by bedtime"? A sudden shower
fans out from camel-coloured clouds.
The little new-drenched leaves
glow in the momentary dark,
dancing.
Humpty Dumpty a
was?
His all-apartity
awash
in royal horses?
(as likely to squash
that goggle-eyed face
in the grass as
to reass-
emble a torso from as
many bits as hash)?
Perhaps poor Humpty had
to tumble so we'd see
all the pieces we need
to make democracy.
- Political Ploy Perhaps, pg. 4
* * *
In cruel office shoes
Five o'clock ladies pound
past, toward their release.
(They're homeward bound.)
Where are the office men?
Spoiling their appetites
with snacks (those on the wagon)?
or having "a quick one"?
When the tide's at full spate
some hasten toward the trains
not free to contemplate
coffees, or wines.
Ladies - a metal contrived
and basic order too -
welcome the men they wived.
"Clean-up's for you!"
- Lemmings, pg. 14
* * *
On a flat stone, in the
plain light, lies a
torn paper with something written
on it. All the wide shore, the
calm lake, the reeds
listen in the sun, in
silence, as do other flat stones.
Writing to read? for a bird in
transit, or for the
breeze that sometimes stirs when a
motionless midday
passes? No one
is left, writer or some
incurious wanderer now
long gone.
Here is only
peacefulness, and several sunny
flat stones.
- Finished When Unfinished, pg. 23
* * *
"Muse is a verb, but she
is a lady sometimes, yes?
Musings are intricate, but why
not a lyric next, if you please?"
"Oh very well - if only
the lady muses will deign
to move such an ungainly
ponderous pen as mine."
For a brilliant moment the sun appears,
makes everything look unreal,
turns icicles into chandeliers,
finds mirrors in glass and steel.
Merriment dances in the twigs
as the winds race over the skies
of the noon-hour passersby.
The winter pigeons, toeing in,
veer from a two-year old
who is trotting after to see them run
on their bare pink feet in the cold.
- Why Not, pg. 38
* * *
The bells are celebrating, where? Why
can we scarcely hear? Bemused:
what day is this? O listen!
Hear it: Jubilate.
- Abandon, pg. 43
* * *
The clouds, the morning
sun are such that
one lettuce-bright tree-tip
over the roofs, like me,
is singled out. We are
sun-gilded.
You smile away
out there.
You are I am
inexpert about timing.
How this instant was
hit upon is
beyond us. We in
passing can
only receive
this befalling, a
blassed one.
- Window Conversation, pg. 57
* * *
Yellow and blue-green young
cottony leaves, in
cloud-shadow and sun, are
four hues over the
wintry rack of branch and tip -
a still becoming form - that summer
trees will enfold fully.
Such blueness in a windy tumbled
sky, and yet so still!
Mist on the lake water is
gashed by an afternoon swimmer;
healing (tiny orblets
of air, resolving welter)
comes even as the
crunch of homebound footsteps
dies away, the towel-draped
swimmer dashing home again
after his icy plunge.
"Laugh before breakfast - tears
by bedtime"? A sudden shower
fans out from camel-coloured clouds.
The little new-drenched leaves
glow in the momentary dark,
dancing.
- Palette, pg. 68
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews