A Current Through the Flesh by Richard-Yves Sitoski
As this suggests, for the author, family came with considerable pain, both psychological and physical.
Poetry
Infinite Audition by Charlie Petch
Anyone who lived in Toronto in the late 80s/early 90s will know this place, will know what this time did to bodies trying to find love and acceptance, bodies willing to pay any price.
Throwback: “Retrace Your Steps (Once) (And Again…Just to Make Sure)”: Attic Rain by Samantha Jones
Attic Rain brought a refreshing authenticity that I didn’t want to part with. Sometimes you’d smile or hum in agreement with how relatable the poems are.
Throwback: Island by Douglas Walbourne-Gough
This is a particularly raw collection of poetry, I felt, the blank verse tumbling across the page in a cry to be read and felt.
Do It Wrong: How to be a Poet in the Twenty-first Century by Derek Beaulieu
Beaulieu asks, why are we writing?
Best Canadian Poetry 2026 selected by Mary Dalton
In the best years, there is a lack of uniformity in poetic styles and moods. This is a good year. Most of the names are familiar with a few poets new to me.
Horses by Jake Skeets
Here, Skeet’s invasion of white space picks up where Eyes Bottle Dark left off and begins with the haunting image of a herd of 191 free-roaming horses found dead, thigh and neck-deep at a stock pond on the Navajo Nation, evaporated through extreme drought caused by “decades-long aggression by the United States and the changing climate”.
Crowd Source by Cecily Nicholson
In Crowd Source, Cecily Nicholson’s latest collection of poetry, she uses a flock of crows as her framing device, linking meditations on a wide variety of topics with the movement of crows.
We Survived Until We Could Live by Uchechukwu Peter Umezurike
He describes We Survived Until We Could Live, his latest collection of poetry as an “attempt to portray a glimpse of war’s horrific aftermath on the family.” In his “attempt to converse with the past,” he believes it is with poetry that he “can document the untold stories of suffering, invite readers into this world, and sharpen their empathy for fellow human beings in pain.”
The Beauty of Vultures, poems by Wendy McGrath, photos by Danny Miles
This collection contains 31 poems arranged in three acts. Miles’s compelling photos—mostly black-and-whites with a few exceptions—appear on facing pages.
Vessel: The Shape of Absent Bodies by Dani Netherclift
I was very intrigued by Vessel, Dani Netherclift’s work on the drowning deaths of her father and brother.
Child of War, a Graphic Poem by Gregory Sass
A “Child of War” could not be more timely and necessary, an urgent SOS message in a time capsule coming to warn us about the horrors that inevitably and sadly repeat themselves as history.
Nothing at All by Olivia Tapiero, translated by Kit Schluter
Nothing at All, Olivia Tapiero’s collection of vignettes exploring loss, illness, desire, and pain was translated from French by Kit Schluter for this edition.
“The Whole School Is in Me”: A Review of Ronna Bloom’s In a Riptide
Bloom opens this collection—her eighth, out now with Brick Books—with “Immeasurable,” a poem about a fleeting connection with a woman on the street
Throwback: Excerpts from a Burned Letter by Joelle Barron
Within a faith tradition that sees only two genders, and from the purview of a small northern community, what can a young person know about themselves and their possibilities?
