To say they distanced
to say it wasnāt about spit
What began as a statement of rot
after reading a book about rot
VALLUM AWARD FOR POETRY 202O WINNER | j tate barlow | WALKING INTO AUGUST IN EAST-END TORONTO 2020
WALKING INTO AUGUST IN EAST-END TORONTO 2020 Is it how spruce donāt think, just doāarrange their boughs for things withwings to dip andglide on through? Or how the yellowcrane loomsāstrange arabesque-sur-bleu, distraction-dance, wide arcs boom-swung and slowādwarfing all thatgrows nearby? Stow yourthrone in a box on high look down waydown to read whatās spelled below […]
VALLUM CHAPBOOK AWARD 2021 FINALITS | David Harvgreaves | WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE SOMEDAY
POSTCARD FROM THE ICE STORM āĀ Independence, Oregon. January 2021 Dear Nā Gone to bed happy, one hundred percent chance of a snow day, they sayā midnightāgun-shot reports of tree-trunks cracked in two, ice-glazed oak chandeliers shattering on the rotunda floor. Utility poles crushing cars, the arctic insurrection cuts internet access, freezing assets and truth conditions. […]
Domenico Capilongo | PASS THE NOTE, Vallum Award for Poetry Honourable Mention
PASS THE NOTE in the palm of your hand. cup it in the hollow between life line and the lines of children. sometimes I check mine to see if my wife is pregnant again. pass it like a drug deal on a crowded subway platform and the trainās about to come. somewhere there is […]
Susan Hughson | APPLE TO APPLE, VALLUM AWARD FOR POETRY HONOURABLE MENTION
APPLE TO APPLE In the season of apples suspended in air, wood piles and winter spiders, you are lost with a canvas bag; an apple a book and a camera. Travel past previous windows, a green house between here and not take a photographbooks hold clues, save the apple for later. You fall forward from […]
Carla Barkman | LAST EVENING I STUMBLED, 2nd Place Winner of the Vallum Award for Poetry
LAST EVENING I STUMBLED Last evening I stumbled past smokers in doorways of boarding houses, ex-sailorsā rooming houses beside the inland sea, & up the gravel road again towards the lighthouse poised between two harbours now its panning light engulfed by Christmas strings of orange & white, & sat still on a Muskoka chair, its […]
Alexei Perry Cox | THE LONG STUDY, 1st Place Winner of the Vallum Award for Poetry
THE LONG STUDY Mother, now listen to my words. I see Your soul in anger; this is a foolish and an evil rage. Oh, I know when we stand before a helpless Doom, how hard it is to bear. [pause] āfrom āIphigenia in Aulis,ā Euripides The Mother talked to me as if I were drawing […]
Catriona Wright | DIETARY RESTRICTIONS, Vallum Award for Poetry Honourable Mention
DIETARY RESTRICTIONS At night I dream of performing polygraph tests on pomegranates. By day I watch Tampopo and think slurp, slurp. Poco a poco I even begin to feel the miso-loaded mist on my face, to taste the universe distilled to a rococo so-and-so of noodles and beef. I canāt even seek the brief, shame-inflected […]
E. Canine McJabber | TO MY MOTHER, ALOUD, 1ST Place Winner of the Vallum Award for Poetry
TO MY MOTHER, ALOUD Send your snail mail and Iāll hide the table salt. When I stamped my last mail-order bride, she threw the book at me. Her velvet twinset in divorce court the only good pairing that came of our match. Now, I work hotlines pushing human tissue samplings: primed for fucks or transplants. […]