For Thanksgiving, a look at Red Curls

...which I placed on leaves I'll likely rake up tomorrow. This new collection of poems by Tracy Hamon means a lot to me, so I wandered around with it this afternoon, placing it here and there until I found the right place.   

Red Curls by Tracy Hamon.

Last week we drove down to Regina to take in the launch of this book, a launch perfectly timed with the fall migration. We drove through sunrise and sunset, beneath thousands and thousands of snow geese, Ross's geese, greater white-fronted geese, tundra swans, beneath v upon v of sandhill cranes. After the launch we spent a few days beneath the fly path, catching our breath, our ears full of geese and swans and cranes at all times.

The launch of Red Curls was breathtaking as well. A great crowd flocked into the Slate Fine Art Gallery, a spacious venue with wonderful sound and fabulous art, so great a crowd they had to bring out more chairs. Tracy gave a dandy reading as always and followed it with a stunning video poem. Images were projected afterwards, people indulging in these and the glorious spread of food and conversation. And what conversation! There's a big difference between small talk and small talks, the latter an art of compression, a kind of poetry that you think about for days, keep unpacking without end, and that's what I've been doing for days, that's what I did all the way home beneath the geese and swans and cranes as we drove against their southward flow, and I'll be unpacking for days to come.