Anvil Island

Today's method was somewhat unusual: I pulled the last issue of Grain magazine from the bookshelf and flipped to the first poem I found that I liked. Here it is, by Paddy McCallum:

Anvil Island

When Al lets a drop of solder fall
into the valve angle-wise and fits
the cap so it sets against any possible
leak of precious fluids, he pulls
his hands away like a god who knows
the world will run without him now
and turns to me and grins and says
"There's a kind of poetry in that"

and I'm not certain where to look
for the wordless poem of action
a friend spoke of following a long fight
with a sockeye near Active Pass,
the boat punching mercilessly against
the ocean's mouth, the fish's body.
Only a god could look upon death
and say there's poetry in that

working so fast there must be
no accident, numbering stars
and sands of the sea, electrons, photons,
the whale at its crest. One god,
a thousand gods, the singular fury
of flesh leaping out of reach until
words in their stalking sequence
clutch gills, scales, the whipping tail.

I play out hooks until the tip strikes
fumble with the plug and dump it
tangled down the wrong black hole
off Anvil Island, where salmon
sleep in a perfect covenant
of day and night. They cast
their sidelong glances at my bait,
then snap it off like blades of light.

~~~~~

You know, when I say little lit mags are the places to find what's great in short stories and poetry today--I mean it. OK, some of it is not the most fabulous. But what is great, is really really great, and sometimes in a totally new and breathtaking way you would never find in a mainstream glossy publication.

So maybe for the next few weeks I'll post these little favourites from small Canadian lit mags, see if I can whet a few appetites.

Posted by Andrea at March 10, 2006 7:09 AM under Friday Poetry Blogging

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