In lush and vivid poems, Cynthia Woodman Kerkham ponders the urgent question, What does water want? Whether as the body of a beloved lake, where people wrestle with the concerns of stewardship, or as the sea in which to sail and drift, or as a gene pool that simmers through a family’s veins, water is the main character here.
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- Published in
- Montreal, CA
- Series
- Hugh MacLennan Poetry Series
Table of Contents
- Cover 1
- Copyright 5
- Contents 8
- Fork Lake 12
- Water Quality 14
- The Lily Pullers 16
- In the Round 17
- Recipe for Invasive Species 18
- Old Gregory 20
- Along Came a Spider 21
- Fork and Spoon Lake 23
- Dereliction, 1908 25
- Spill 26
- World War 27
- Live Trap 28
- Border Control 29
- Second Lake Report 30
- Shift 31
- I Sip a Glass of Wine by the Lake 32
- Lake Ghazal 33
- Wedding 34
- Fragrant Harbour 36
- Sampan, 1962 38
- After Fifty Years, Return to Hong Kong 40
- Man o’ War, 1963 42
- Diamond-Water Paradox 43
- At Tai O Village, 2017 44
- Invisible Stitching 46
- Lessons in Diplomacy, 1965 47
- Public Records Office, Diagnostic Survey, 1960s 49
- Expats, 1960s 51
- Master and Man 53
- Like a Moth to a Flame 58
- Hike on Lantau Island, 1968 60
- Gold Dinner Bell 62
- Eight Imitations of the Poet Wang Wei 63
- Gene Pool 68
- Pools 70
- Crossword 71
- Burnt Pot, Riverbank, Indifferent Sky 73
- I Pay a Man to Wash the Windows 76
- How We Name Things from Our Own Seat in the Chevy 77
- On Taming Foxes 78
- Pierced 79
- Slant Rhyme for Orchid 80
- Icarus’s Mother 81
- Granddaughter in Another City 82
- Backyard 83
- Baby in the Bathwater 85
- Changing 87
- On Fridays with You, This Game 88
- Recipe with Eggs 89
- First Room 90
- What Water Wants 92
- Eve River Estuary 94
- With No Sweet Water / 水调歌头∙难溯甘泉 96
- Four Ws 99
- Light Showers, Wi-Fi 101
- Argument with Captain Vancouver over the Naming of Desolation Sound 102
- Rogue 106
- Pachina Bay, ؛Anaqtl’a 108
- Nameless Lake 110
- Rewilding 111
- Automatic Door 112
- Selling Soffio 113
- Once We Were Animalcules 114
- Lament of a Hypocrite Gardener 118
- Pipe Dreams 120
- The Last Day of the Paris Climate Change Conference, I go to a Beach Spa 121
- What Does Water Want? 122
- The Disturbed Land 124
- Notes and Acknowledgments 126
