In this new and masterful collection, Griffin Poetry Prize winner Jane Munro balances her signature themes—dream life, the visual arts, the mysteries of the natural world—with an urgent, more directly political voice.
False Creek, Munro's eighth collection of poetry, responds to the discovery of sodded-over graves around residential schools and the elimination of Sən̓aʔqʷ, home to fifteen thousand Sḵwx̱wú7mesh before the genocide caused by European diseases. Poems ask What counts as violence? and address erasure. Others reflect on False Creek's reduction to one-fifth its original size, offer a litany of species living there before the destruction of habitat, and observe how it remains a cherished inlet to the heart of Vancouver.
As Munro walks around False Creek images arise. In content and form, the book ranges far and wide. While not shirking painful realities, the poems support the human capacity to climb ladders, arrive at fresh points of view, listen to one another, and greet despair with wit, attention, intention—and hope.