Before the First Word: The Poetry of Lorna Crozier (Laurier Poetry)

Lorna Crozier’s radical imagination, and the finely tuned emotional intelligence that is revealed in the clarity of her poetry, have made her one of Canada’s most popular poets. Before the First Word: The Poetry of Lorna Crozier is a collection of thirty-five of her best poems, selected and introduced by Catherine Hunter, and includes an afterword by Crozier herself. Representing her work from 1985 to 2002, the collection reveals the wide range of Lorna Crozier’s voice in its most lyrical, contemplative, ironic, and witty moments. Hunter’s introduction discusses the poet’s major themes, with particular attention to her feminist approach to biblical myth and her fascination with absence and silence as sites for imaginative revision. Crozier’s afterword, “See How Many Ends This Stick Has: A Reflection on Poetry,” is a lyrical meditation that provides an inspirational glimpse into the philosophy of a writer who prizes the intensity of awareness that poetry demands, and is tantalized by what predates speaking and all that cant be named. An engaging volume that will appeal to undergraduate students as well as general readers of poetry. Lorna Crozier’s work has won many awards, including the Governor Generals Award in 1992 (for Inventing the Hawk), the first prize for poetry in the CBC Literary Competition, the Canadian Authors Association Award for Poetry in 1992, a National Magazine Award in 1995, and two Pat Lowther Memorial Awards (1993 and 1996) for the best book of poetry by a Canadian woman. She has published fourteen books of poetry, most recently, Whetstone. Born in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, she now lives in British Columbia, where she is a Distinguished Professor at the University of Victoria. Table of Contents......Page 6 Foreword......Page 8 Biographical Note......Page 9 Introduction......Page 10 Still-Life......Page 19 Poem about Nothing......Page 20 This is a Love Poem without Restraint......Page 23 The Child Who Walks Backwards......Page 26 Carrots......Page 27 Onions......Page 28 Fear of Snakes......Page 29 Quitting Smoking......Page 30 The Goldberg Variations......Page 32 Home Town......Page 33 Male Thrust......Page 34 Mother and I, Walking......Page 35 How to Stop Missing Your Friend Who Died......Page 36 On the Seventh Day......Page 37 Living Day by Day......Page 39 Angel of Bees......Page 40 Canada Day Parade......Page 41 The Dark Ages of the Sea......Page 43 The Red Onion in Skagway, Alaska......Page 45 The Wild Boys......Page 47 The Garden at Night......Page 50 Going Back......Page 51 Dust......Page 52 The Kind of Woman......Page 53 Not the Music......Page 55 Mrs. Bentley......Page 56 Packing for the Future: Instructions......Page 57 Watching My Lover......Page 59 What You Remember Remains......Page 61 A Kind of Love......Page 62 Wildflowers......Page 64 The Origin of the Species......Page 65 What the Snake Brings to the World......Page 67 Original Sin: 1. The First Woman......Page 68 Original Sin: 2. The Fall of Eve......Page 70 The Sacrifice of Isaac......Page 71 Afterword: See How Many Ends This Stick Has......Page 73 Acknowledgements......Page 79 "In the 1950s, Anne Innis Dagg was a young zoologist with a lifelong love of giraffe and a dream to study them in Africa. Based on extensive journals and letters home, Pursuing Giraffe vividly chronicles the realization of that dream and the year that she spent studying and documenting giraffe behaviour. Dagg was one of the first zoologists to study wild animals in Africa (before Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey); her memoir captures her youthful enthusiasm for her journey, as well as her naivete about the social and political issues in Africa." Annotation Memoir Of One Of First Female Zoologists In Africa. Documents Dagg's Study Of Giraffe. Examines Racism, Colonialism, And Life As A Woman Scientist In The 1950s.