undercurrent - Softcover

Wong, Rita

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0889713081 ISBN 13: 9780889713086

Publisher: Blewointment, 2015

Synopsis

The water belongs to itself. undercurrent reflects on the power and sacredness of water―largely underappreciated by too many―whether it be in the form of ocean currents, the headwaters of the Fraser River or fluids in the womb. Exploring a variety of poetic forms, anecdote, allusion and visual elements, this collection reminds humanity that we are water bodies, and we need and deserve better ways of honouring this.

Poet Rita Wong approaches water through personal, cultural and political lenses. She humbles herself to water both physically and spiritually: "i will apprentice myself to creeks & tributaries, groundwater & glaciers / listen for the salty pulse within, the blood that recognizes marine ancestry." She witnesses the contamination of First Nations homelands and sites, such as Gregoire Lake near Fort McMurray, AB: "though you look placid, peaceful dibenzothiophenes / you hold bitter, bitumized depths." Wong points out that though capitalism and industry are supposed to improve our quality of life, they're destroying the very things that give us life in the first place. Listening to and learning from water is key to a future of peace and creative potential.

undercurrent emerges from the Downstream project, a multifaceted, creative collaboration that highlights the importance of art in understanding and addressing the cultural and political issues related to water. The project encourages public imagination to respect and value water, ecology and sustainability. Visit downstream.ecuad.ca.

About this title

About the Author

Rita Wong is the author of four books of poetry: monkeypuzzle (Press Gang, 1998), forage (Nightwood Editions, 2007), sybil unrest (Line Books, 2008, with Larissa Lai) and undercurrent (Nightwood Editions, 2015). forage was the winner of the 2008 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize and Canada Reads Poetry 2011. Wong is an associate professor in the Critical and Cultural Studies department at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design on the unceded Coast Salish territories also known as Vancouver.

Reviews

Wong's deeply personal collection is a powerful undertow of a book. Focusing on water, she charts a course of ecological poetry through tangled personal reflection, environmental and social conscience, and memoir. The visual storytellingâ through stunning layout choices, illustrations, and a single photographâ has a powerful effect. The mixed media approach gives the poetry a fluid quality that effectively highlights the book's exploratory prose, lending an allusion to flow and bodies of water in placement and presentation of text. A fluidity is felt too in Wong's blending of her own cultural experience with those of indigenous nations in Canada, whose presence and experiences permeate the book. Wong's notes, directly set into the text, accompany and become part of the poems themselves, and the list of "References and Influences" further serves to underscore that this is a work with wide-ranging depths. It is, in many ways, more of an immersion experience than a text, and as such it is highly recommended. (July) \n

Edition details

• Publisher: Blewointment
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0889713081
• ISBN 13: 9780889713086
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 96