Author: admin

I had to see La Bohème again just to
make sure for there was a little part of
me that kept the regret though when I tried
the argument again I used both hands
in order to explain and I was especially
sensitive to the landlord for I lived
both inside and outside even when I was angry
I paid my debts for I have listened to
and lived with grasshoppers and they bore me, but
Mimi, Mimi, when your hand dropped every
woman in my row was weeping and I
gave in too instead of gripping the armrest
or rubbing the back of my head; I loved it the most that
you lived inside and outside too, the snowdrop
was what you thought of, wasn’t it? You were
the one who came back, three times, it was your stubbornness,
your loyalty. One time I stood in the street
and watched a moon so thin the clouds went through it
as if there were no body, as if the cold
was so relentless nothing could live there, you with
the blackened cancle, you who stitched the lily.

Notes on the Poem
Gerald Stern is obviously fascinated with the opera La Bohème, especially the main character whose name forms the title of this poem from his 2003 Griffin Poetry Prize shortlisted collection American Sonnets: Poems. It appears that fascination even predates the poem that appears in this collection ... and we also know that his abiding interest in this classic is shared by many others.

Composed in the 1890's, Giacomo Puccini's La Bohème's libretto is based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger. The story takes place in Paris around 1830, depicting the Bohemian lifestyle of a poor seamstress named Mimi and the closest of her artist friends. The story is told in more detail, corresponding act by act to the operatic rendition, here.

Stern weaves thematic and dramatic aspects of La Bohème into "Mimi", from:

"I was especially
sensitive to the landlord for I lived
both inside and outside"

to the touching:

"Mimi, Mimi, when your hand dropped every
woman in my row was weeping and I
gave in too"

Before American Sonnets: Poems was published in 2002, Stern had a previous poem with the same title published in the June, 1994 edition of Poetry magazine, which was subsequently included in his 1995 collection Odd Mercy. It's a wholly different poem from the "Mimi" found in American Sonnets: Poems and the 2003 Griffin Poetry Prize anthology, but it too ponders La Bohème, as it moves somewhat abruptly from contemplating grackles and other urban wildlife to:

"I'm listening
to La Bohème. It gives me
a second history. My grandfather
heard it in Poland. Puccini

was more a hawk than a grackle;
he hunted larks."

... and, like the 2002 "Mimi", the narrator pauses to consider her tragic death. 
Take some time to read both poems. Can you see other points of connection between them, apart from the specific references to the opera and the character of Mimi?

Clearly, Stern wends up and down many ruminative paths inspired by La Bohème, and produces his own unique pieces of art inspired by it. The same is true of other artists working from the same source. Learn here how a small theatre troupe built on the story of Mimi and her friends, and then mounted this singular production:




Go ahead, enjoy - you've got time to take this all in. The production was presented, by the way, at the Tranzac Club in Toronto's Annex neighbourhood, a venue that often hosts poetry readings and book launches. It's a place to which many Canadian poets are likely hoping to return when the world returns to a semblance of normal.

Even with its shitload of artifacts, the everyday
is radiant, while the banal is opaque and often
obscure. I prefer the latter, with its murky
agate, mushroom, ochre background music –
its corridor of lurk. One hardly knows where
one stands with/in the banal. Walls come
together with hardly a seam. Wherever we are, we
feel we have always been. Poe, for all his special
effects, is rather banal in his approach to the
supernatural, i.e. overly familiar. Against the
inarticulate velvet of this mood, one grasps at
the everyday for relief. Thus any object can
bring us back with the fast-acting power of
aspirin. Any object shines.

Notes on the Poem
Not unlike our previous Poem of the Week, this week's poem, "The Banal" from Elaine Equi's 2008 Griffin Poetry Prize shortlisted collection Ripple Effect takes as its starting point the differences or perceived differences between two words that signify similar things. Equi's poem scrutinizes the words "everyday" and "banal".

Let's quickly consult some dictionary definitions as we proceed. The Cambridge Dictionary defines "everyday" as "ordinary, typical, or usual" with synonyms such as "quotidian", "unremarkable" and "workaday". The same dictionary defines "banal" as "boring, ordinary, and not original" with synonyms such as "commonplace" and "trite".

Both words share the sense of the ordinary. At a glance, however, "everyday" looks neutral or benign, with the worst said about it that it might describe or denote something as "unremarkable". By contrast, "banal" looks like the more derogatory term, as its definition and synonyms could be taken as dismissive and insulting.

Equi's poem's narrator is perhaps being contrarian then, by expressing a preference for "banal" ...

"with its murky
agate, mushroom, ochre background music - 
its corridor of lurk. One hardly knows where
one stands with/in the banal."


Whatever your preference - if you even have one - it's interesting to see where this contemplation of the ordinary goes. Added to that is how a contemplation of the ordinary - its neutral presence, but maybe also its constancy and in a way, comfort - can change as circumstances change, personally and in the world. When circumstances change, especially dramatically, poetry that entertains, amuses, challenges or holds us in good stead might shift in meaning, but still ground us. Somehow, the words and forms of good poetry have both strength and flexibility that move with us and still have significance for us.

At a time other than the present, a poem such as "The Banal" might resonate with our more personal and specific experiences. We might chuckle or be ruefully aware of a minor failing with a phrase like "shitload of artifacts", for example. When a broader calamity forces many more of us, or all of us, into the same circumstances - feeling fear, isolation, uncertainty - that same poem does not fail or abandon us. Phrases such as:

"one grasps at
the everyday for relief"

scale to the scope of that new, even if perilous situation or condition.

"Any object shines."

is not just a commercial jingle purveying "fast-acting power". It simply and powerfully brings comfort.

Equi not only manages this robustness in long established work on the page that we can return to again and again, but in the comparative ephemerality of contemporary social media. Her occasional poetry on Twitter captures strikingly what we are all feeling right now. Take a look and take a breath.

Not knowing the difference between Heaven
And Paradise, he called them both Heaven.
So when he shrugged at the thought of a god
Blanched in the lights of implausible heights,
Thumbing the armrests of a throne, that was
Heaven. And when he stared out at the sea,
Feeling familiar to himself at last,
He called that Heaven, too. And nothing changed
About either Paradise or Heaven
For it: Paradise retained its earthen
Glamour; and Heaven, because it can’t stand
For anything on its own, like the color
Of rice or a bomb, was happy to play
Along, was happy just to be happy
For once, and not an excuse for mayhem.

Notes on the Poem
How wonderful that "Kingdom Come", a poem from Rowan Ricardo Phillips' 2016 Griffin Poetry Prize shortlisted collection Heaven considers the differences - if any - between Heaven and Paradise.

This discussion of English language and usage boils it down to Paradise referring to a perfect earthly world, while Heaven is "where good people go when they die." Phillips hints at that same distinction with:

"the thought of a god
Blanched in the lights of implausible heights,
Thumbing the armrests of a throne"

versus

"Paradise retained its earthen
Glamour"

However, several Bible study online resources point out that Luke 23:39-43 includes this exchange between Jesus and one of the thieves when they were hanging on the cross:


Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”


Paradise could be where Jesus is and would be, because Jesus told the thief he was going to be there with him. It might also must be a place that those who have faith in the Lord will enter immediately upon death - which, by the previous discussion, would be Heaven. Or is it some middle terrain, such as what some refer to as purgatory?

Phillips concludes wisely that however you want to see it, with whatever measure of religious or spiritual interpretations applied, we can take a cue from Heaven itself, which

"was happy to play
Along, was happy just to be happy
For once, and not an excuse for mayhem."

Maybe you've pondered this, maybe not ... but maybe it is a good and comforting thing to meditate upon, especially at times when neither Heaven nor Paradise seem to be in reach.

‘The truth is I’m not /a fist fighter,’ writes Raymond Antrobus, ‘I’m all heart, no technique.’ Readers who fall for this streetwise feint may miss out on the subtle technique – from the pantoum and sestina to dramatic monologue and erasure – of The Perseverance. But this literary debut is all heart, too. Heart plus technique. All delivered in a voice that resists over-simple categorization. As a poet of d/Deaf experience, his verse gestures toward a world beyond sound. As a Jamaican/British poet, he deconstructs the racialized empire of signs from within. Perhaps that slash between verses and signs is where the truth is.

Notes on the Poem
If you've followed the Griffin Poetry Prize Poem of the Week feature for any amount of time (this is week 422 in our uninterrupted presentation of work from or associated with the prize's shortlists), we regularly take as our cue the observations of our judges about the collections from which these poems came. These citations are thoughtful, well-crafted tributes that are regularly creative and poetic mini works unto themselves.

The citation for Raymond Antrobus' 2019 Griffin Poetry Prize shortlisted collection The Perseverance opens with a brief, memorable quotation from the poem "After Being Called a Fucking Foreigner in London Fields". From that quotation, the citation plays off its fighting metaphor with the phrase "streetwise feint". It then segues to a counter-argument to the poem's claim that the narrator (and by extension Antrobus) has "no technique" and praises his indeed subtle and formidable technique. It considers, as well, the immensity of the heart in this collection.

A small but significant element in the citation's opening is the use of the slash (/) to delineate the line breaks in the layout of the poem from which the excerpt is taken. In this first of three uses of the slash in this citation, it is used to separate, a convention that is explained here. Interestingly, this same slight symbol is used for the exact opposite purpose - to bring together - in the following two instances.

The slash is used again in the adjective "d/Deaf", which we confirmed is pronounced "deaf" when we prepared the audio version of this citation:



The adjective "deaf" (with a lower-case "d") is a medical term referring to people who have little or no functional hearing. The adjective "Deaf" (with a capital "D") is, as explained by the Canadian Association of the Deaf, "a sociological term referring to those individuals who are medically deaf or hard of hearing who identify with and participate in the culture, society, and language of Deaf people, which is based on Sign language." The slash draws both worlds together with the same subtlety with which the citation praises Antrobus' stirring work.

The slash appears again in "Jamaican/British", describing other worlds and cultures the poet has navigated and reflected and reflected on in his work. In this and the previous instance, the slash is a unifying element. The citation wraps that up magnificently as it concludes:

"Perhaps that slash between verses and signs is where the truth is."

The following are other selected judges' citations that present Griffin Poetry Prize winning and shortlisted works in particularly beautiful and at times provocative fashion.



Men in the Off Hours by Anne Carson
Griffin Poetry Prize 2001 - Canadian Winner
(Judges: Carolyn Forche, Dennis Lee, Paul Muldoon)


Born to Slow Horses by Kamau Brathwaite
Griffin Poetry Prize 2006 - International Winner
(Judges: Lavinia Greenlaw, Lisa Robertson, Eliot Weinberger)


Methodist Hatchet by Ken Babstock
Griffin Poetry Prize 2012 - Canadian Winner
(Judges: Heather McHugh, David O'Meara, Fiona Sampson)

Ocean by Sue Goyette
Griffin Poetry Prize 2014 - Canadian Shortlist
(Judges: Robert Bringhurst, Jo Shapcott, CD Wright)


Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings by Joy Harjo
Griffin Poetry Prize 2016 - International Shortlist
(Judges: Alice Oswald, Tracy K Smith, Adam Sol)




You can find citations for all works associated with the Griffin Poetry Prize shortlists on the pages showcasing the works and poets.

That Boxing Day morning, I would hear the familiar, far-off gowls and
                    gulders

over Keenaghan and Aughanlig
of a pack of beagles, old dogs disinclined to chase a car suddenly quite
                    unlike

themselves, pups coming helter-skelter
across the plowlands with all the chutzpah of veterans
of the trenches, their slate-grays, cinnamons, liver-browns, lemons, rusts,
                    and violets

turning and twisting, unseen, across the fields,
their gowls and gulders turning and twisting after the twists and turns
of the great hare who had just now sauntered into the yard where I stodd
                    on tiptoe

astride my new Raleigh cycle,
his demeanor somewhat louche, somewhat lackadaisical
under the circumstances, what with him standing on tiptoe
as if to mimic me, standing almost as tall as I, looking as if he might for a
                    moment put
himself in my place, thinking better of it, sloping off behind the lorry bed.

Notes on the Poem
You're left smiling at the end (every time, because you're sure to reread it) of Paul Muldoon's poem "Beagles", from his 2003 Griffin Poetry Prize winning collection Moy sand and gravel. What elements combine to make this poem so pleasing?

For starters, how about the mouthfuls of chewy, delicious words, wonderful to speak aloud and relish, even if you don't know but can imagine their meanings? There's "helter-skelter", there's "chutzpah" ... there are our favourites, "gowls and gulders". They all lend a pell-mell sense to the opening of the poem, capturing the surprisingly uncharacteristic activity of the titular beasts "suddenly quite unlike themselves."

Then, there's the contrast of that tumble of motion, cacophony and even colour ...

"their slate-grays, cinnamons, liver-browns, lemons, rusts,
                    and violets" 

brought up against the stillness of the sauntering great hare. It brings you up short in glorious, comic, skidding fashion, as if you've just put the brakes on your "new Raleigh cycle". And then there's a moment or two to just sink into that stillness, a stillness that, in a somewhat different but relevant context, actor Ben Kingsley explained in a 2018 interview:


"[Stillness is] a vital part of my currency as an actor. I liken it to grace notes in music. In the course of a performance, it may be in that moment of stillness that the viewer gets a view into whatever process is going on inside the character," he said. "I think those spaces in movies are precious. They invite the audience to come in and rest in the space created by it, to appreciate the story being told.""



From there, the touch of comic anthropomorphism that ping-pongs between the hare and the youthful narrator is a final grand touch ... and then you smile, go back, and read it all again.