A Poet’s Nanaimo

I offered a summer pop-up women’s Writing Life women’s writing circle recently on the theme of “Inside the Treasure House.” It’s a theme I’ve used before, and thought it a good time to revisit and acknowledge our gifts.In the circle, we are honoured for who we are and...

Lynda Barry’s What It Is published in hard cover in 2008 is now out in soft cover (Drawn & Quarterly, 2024). The first edition won the comic industry’s 2009 Eisner Award for Best Reality-Based Work.What It Is is a wonderful combination of a graphic novel, memoir,...

In the photograph taken by my friend Wendy Morisseau, I'm sitting in my living room in Nanaimo where I usually lead women's writing circles called Writing Life. After many years, I'll be offering some writing circles again, open to everyone, at Bethlehem Centre in...

bookmakerfirst I fold the mountainthen the valley The haiku above opens poet and paper artist Terry Ann Carter’s eighth book of poetry, First I Fold The Mountain: A Love Letter to Books (Black Moss Press, 2022). Terry Ann is also a bookmaker and very possibly “a paper...

I started to get excited by maps in my first grade classroom when Mrs. Lett pulled down the world map in front of the blackboard and used her pointer to show us where we lived: Eganville, Ontario, Canada. Having seen the many possibilities of personal mapmaking since...

A Curious Happiness in Small Things (Raven Chapbooks, 2020) – such a perfect title for a book of poetry, especially this book of praise poems by David Haggart. The poem from which the book takes its title is about the narrator’s ride in the back of a pick-up driven by...