Rob Budde Flicker

Rob Budde


celebrate the launch
of his new book, Flicker

Go here to order





Charmagne de Veer
Marketing Coordinator
Signature Editions
PO Box 206, RPO Corydon
Winnipeg, MB R3M 3S7
T: 204-779-7803
F: 204-779-6970
marketing@signature-editions.com

The feedback cycle feedback cycle by Ken Belford

At times it’s hard to tell the difference

between a word and a decision.

Understanding’s accumulate.

There are bindings between words,

a kind of retrieval of memory traces.

First I saw distant lightning,

then heard what I thought was thunder,

then trees coming down, a chain reaction.

New meanings fold into the interchange.

Word or part word, poetry isn’t always

an act of understanding. Consciousness

is an episodic series of moments but narrative isn’t

necessarily consciousness. Fix saw, cut pole,

sometimes there’s a darkness in the brain.

There’s something beyond what can be grasped

even in poetry, beyond the list of words

that do not appear. Subjects discriminate,

and there’s an infinite variety of forms

in the background feedback cycle of cues.

The Soup by Rob Budde

make it quickly, without
speaking and use only what’s
at hand, chance is your ally
the pot, the colander without rim

—don’t drive anywhere,
ever, walk, write, or invite a neighbour
with the ingredients, never go
for flash or imports—keep it local,
simple, smell the bunch and you’ll know

it should be chilly outside but
no flurries yet; the words
diffuse ice fog, a suggestion of
spice but let the stock take it all

toss it together the timing and
root and juices and let it stew

tell a friend what’s in it and
how poetry is hearty, how
it cleans the blood

there should be no flourish or garnish
no main dish or dessert;
don’t let one vegetable dominate the dish—
variety is the strength, what keeps it going

the ladle and bowl should be plain,
well made and sturdy, they will
be scuffed and nicked with use—
this is a good sign

serve hot so it fills the room with its
energy, be assured it is a mantra, something
to believe in, something you’re part of

home when it moves you, by Gillian Wigmore

With the launch of home when it moves you, Creekstone Press is honoured to bring Gillian Wigmore’s powerful poems to public attention.


“What a wonderful, fresh voice Gillian Wigmore brings to the page,” writes award winning poet Robert Hilles.

“These wise poems know the push and pull within family. They reveal the
tender truths behind the rough edges of small town life.
Her voice resonates with authenticity, and whether she
is writing about a near drowning or ice fishing, she is
ultimately writing about the complications of love. These
are poems you will not soon forget.”

In this collection of nine poems, Wigmore demonstrates
with astonishing skill the kind of spare poetics that she
strives for. Each of her poems is a complete story, a vibrant
collection of sound and images that pulls the reader into
her landscape and makes her poetry imperative.

With the publication of home when it moves you Creekstone
Press is pleased to announce the launch of a regional
collaboration with Dawson Creek poet, Donna Kane,
and Prince George poet, George Sipos, to create
design-rich handmade chapbooks.

“I think the goal of book design is to make readers more
attentive of the work inside,” says Kane. “A handmade
book honours the poems in an even more personal way.
My hope is to give each step of building this chapbook
the same care and thought as the words that make up
Jill's wonderful poems.”

Retail price: Handmade limited edition (ISBN 0-9684043-7-5), $17
Facsimile: (ISBN 0-9684043-8-3), $12

Landmarks by Ken Belford

for Si

Up is north and now that I’m older
and more complex, more close
to the rising and the setting -
there are two countries, one
at the top edge of the map,
the other at the bottom.
When the current increases,
so does the field, and the spin
of bodies and waves in the night sky
are landmarks used for direction.
If you go up the river
until you come to the end of it,
then go down the valley where
the water flows the other way
for a long time, you will see
what I mean. I was repelled
by other things and you, a primary
direction in the form of a turning
point, were an outside influence
that flipped my poles.

The Lyric Launched: George Sipos

A newly released book of poetry by a Prince George literary mainstay:

George Sipos, Anything but the Moon , Goose Lane

George Sipos, until recently, owned and ran Mosquito Books, an independent bookstore. He now works as General Manager of the Prince George Symphony Orchestra. He is acutely aware that life, in its strangeness and beauty, will always elude whatever he can say about it. The tension between the humble recognition that words are in-adequate and the insistent urge to capture what he sees and feels gives Anything but the Moon its blend of quiet reverence and meditative urgency. In lush lyric poems about driving in his truck or listening to the sounds of a henhouse, Sipos reflects upon how everyday ex-periences slip through our fingers, never to be fully understood or articulated. The rhythms of his poetry are beautifully shaped to the arc of seeing and thinking.

For Prince George Citizens by Rob Budde

                                 close to
cottonwood siphons, traveled
in the blood valley and lakes 
they stay where bills dissolve
and families of mergansers 
reform from them

the air is a cipher;
the sidewalks crack with those already left

how a river might slice through
your heart as it outlasts its function—that affinity
to the sculptured moose with sunglasses,
the gargoyles of too much beer,
northern hardware holding on

the welcome here--the pick-up
pulls up exhausted holding the newspaper headline high:
the big men are coming to town tomorrow
and the streets are blocked with living

lettering on the old diner still in relief
proclaims that moss is filling our lungs
sucking out the beloved toxins without our knowing
 
you see, the going back is hardest, wheels
on the future paddle past the bank,
trust in disbelief and the way stones float

UNBC Aboriginal Writers and Storytellers Festival

Festival Schedule

(All events free and open to the public
except the Gala Evening Friday Sept 29th)


Sunday, Sept 25 8:30 pm - Poetry Train 2 reading
Lee Maracle, Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm, Joanne Arnott, Michael Blackstock, Heather Harris
Railway & Forestry Museum

Monday, Sept 26 2:00 pm - Michael Blackstock photo exhibit, Louie Singers & a talk on the Nadleh Whut'en Culturally Modified Tree installation
UNBC Atrium (reception to follow)

Wednesday, Sept 28 6:15pm Rm 7-158 (reception to start)
7:00 - Storytellers

Friday, Sept 30 7:00 - GALA Evening
Louie Singers, Marcel Gagnon, Nak'ulamen Performance Collective, cc Hamel, storytelling, more
Playhouse Theatre
(tickets available through UNBC FN Centre)

Saturday, Oct 1 7:30 - Marilyn Dumont, Eden Robinson, Jeannette Armstrong, Janet Marie Rogers
Two Rivers Gallery

Monday, Oct 3 6:30 - Marie Annharte Baker
7-150 UNBC

Tuesday, Oct 4 7:00 - Storytellers
7-150 UNBC

Friday, Oct 7 7:30 pm - Tomson Highway
UNBC Atrium (reception to follow)

Saturday, Oct 8 1:00 pm - Marie Clements, Garry Gottfriedson,
Richard Van Camp
Art Space (reception to follow)

Honorary Prince George Writers

Jay MillAr

Jay MillAr is a writer, editor, publisher, bookseller and environmental research assistant. He is the author of The Ghosts of Jay MillAr (Coach House, 2000), and Mycological Studies (Coach House, 2002), which was shortlisted for the ReLit Poetry Prize. He publishes chapbooks under the imprint BookThug and distributes these titles through Apollinaire’s Bookshoppe—his “imaginary bookstore specializing in publications that no one wants to buy.” His most recent book is from blewointment books of Nightwood and called False Maps for Other Creatures. He lives in Toronto with his wife, Hazel, and their sons, Reid and Cole.

Robert Creeley

Robert Creeley was born in Massachusetts in 1926 and graduated from Black Mountain College where he befriended Charles Olson and edited The Black Mountain Review. Publications include: For Love (1962); Words (1967); Pieces (1969); The Finger (1970); St Martin's (1971); A Day Book (1972); Thirty Things (1974); Away (1976); Later (1978) and Memory Gardens (1986). He held the poetics chair at the State University of NY at Buffalo prior to Charles Bernstein. Creeley came to Prince George to read in the 1970s and has since kept in touch with local writers Barry McKinnon and Ken Belford.

Al Purdy

Al Purdy is one of Canada’s best-known and most-loved poets. His cantankerous persona roamed the country for over four decades, delighting and shocking audiences with his candour and humour. He published thirty-three books of poetry and is best known for his ribald, down-to-earth voice and his representations of distinctively Canadian experiences and landscapes. His poems deal with intimate human emotions across a variety of situations ranging from personal insecurity to human history. His most famous books include The Cariboo Horses (1965), North of Summer(1967), Sex & Death (1973), and Piling Blood (1984). Two major collections of his work have been published: The Collected Poems of Al Purdy (1986) and Beyond Remembering: The Collected Poems of Al Purdy(2000).

George Stanley

George Stanley was born and raised in San Francisco where, in the sixties, he was a member of Jack Spicer's circle. A long time educator in Terrace, BC, Stanley is now retired and living in Vancouver. His books include The Stick, Opening Day, Temporarily, San Francisco's Gone, Gentle Northern Summer, and most recently, A Tall, Serious Girl (San Francisco: Qua Press).

George Bowering

Novelist, poet, editor, professor and historian, George Bowering was recently named the first Poet Laureate of Canada. A native of British Columbia, Bowering has made an outstanding contribution to arts and culture in this province. While he has a prominent international and national profile, his work is inescapably rooted in BC, with stories of growing up in the Okanagan, haunting poems of urban Vancouver, and his innovative treatment of historical B.C. events. Bowering has authored more than 80 books and his work has been translated into French, Spanish, Italian, German, Chinese and Romanian. His writing includes books of poetry, fiction, autobiography, biography, collaborations and youth fiction. His award-winning titles include: George Bowering Select, Rocky Mountain Foot, The Gangs of Kosmos, Burning Water, and, His Life: A Poem. In 2001, he retired as a professor at Simon Fraser University where he taught and inspired two generations of young writers. Bowering supports the work of other writers as a generous mentor and literary critic.

Simon Thompson

Simon Thompson, MA, is the English and Writing Instructor at the Terrace Campus of NorthWest community College. He has read in Prince George many times and has adopted Barry McKinnon's printing press that has made many famous Caledonia Writing Series and Gorse Press chapbooks over the years.

Donna Kane

Donna Kane lives and writes in Dawson Creek, BC. Her work has appeared in sub-TERRAIN, Geist, Contemporary Verse 2, and The Malahat Review. She has participated in the Banff Centre for the Arts writing program. Her Hagios Press book, Somewhere, a Fire was published in 2004.

rob mclennan

rob mclennan is a prolific poet, editor, publisher & visual artist. The author of over three dozen poetry chapbooks, he won the 1999 CAA/Air Canada Award for most promising writer (in any genre) in Canada under 30. He has published poetry, fiction & critical work in nearly two hundred publications across Canada, the US, England, Finland, Ireland, Australia, India, & the Czech Republic. He has done dozens of readings across Canada, & in Ireland & the US, including The Ottawa International Writers Festival, The Winnipeg Writers Festival, Via Rail Great Canadian Writers Tour, the University of Maine, & the Galway Arts Center. Recently, rob wrote an essay called "Sex at Thirty-One -- McKinnon, Fawcett, Gold, Stanley, etc." on Poetics.ca about Barry McKinnon and other writers connected to Prince George.

Robert Kroetsch

Robert Kroetsch was born in 1927 in Heisler, Alberta. He attended the University of Alberta and then and U of Iowa. After a stint working on the river boats in the Yukon and the Northwest Territories, he eventually taught at S.U.N.Y. Binghamton. Kroetsch then taught writing and literature at the University of Calgary and the University of Manitoba. At the U of M he was mentor to Rob Budde. He now lives in Winnipeg. Kroetsch is internationally know as a poet and novelist. He is also widely acknowledged in Canada for his literary criticism and theory. Kroetsch won the Governor General's Literary Award for fiction with his novel The Studhorse Man.

G.P. Lainsbury

G.P. Lainsbury is an English Instructor & Senior Instructor in the Academic Program at Northern Lights College in Fort St. John. His book, entitled The Carver Chronotype: Inside the Life-World of Raymond Carver's Fiction, argues that "despite having worked primarily in 'minor' genres, Raymond Carver merits consideration as a major American writer." Also, Lainsbury's article "Generation X and the End of History," first published in Essays in Canadian Literature, has been collected in the volume GenXegisis: Essays on Alternative Youth (Sub)Culture. Lainsbury began teaching for NLC in September 1995, and received his PhD in American Literature from Simon Fraser University in1996. As well as teaching courses in literature, film, creative writing and workplace communication, Lainsbury is also Poetry Editor of the journal Textual Studies in Canada, director of the Fort St. John Poetics Research Group and publisher of Cosmodemonic Poetics.

Eden Robinson

Eden Robinson is a Haisla woman who grew up near Kitimat, British Columbia. Her previous collection of stories, Traplines, was awarded the Winifred Holtby Prize for the best first work of fiction by a Commonwealth writer and was a New York Times Editor’s Choice and Notable Book of the Year. Monkey Beach, Robinson’s acclaimed first novel, won the B.C. Book Prize for Fiction, was a finalist for the 2000 Giller Prize and was longlisted for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Her newest book Blood Sports will be out soon.

Who is missing here? Add to the list!

Michael Armstrong--In Their Nightgowns, Dancing

The first literary release by UNBC Press!

Launch & Book Signing
Michael Armstrong's In Their Nightgowns, Dancing
Now on sale at better bookstores! or
to order click here



"Michael Armstrong has crafted a lyrical and haunting play that captivates with its sensuous imagery, riveting journey, and naked honesty. His story of two people each blown by the winds of enormous political and social forces resounds with authenticity of place, time, and character. This play is funny and tender and a gorgeous examination of possibility, chance, imagination, coincidence, opportunity, and all those endless forks in roads that combine to make a life. It is a richly rewarding story of rebirth and hope in that eternal human struggle to understand who we are as individuals. What I loved and still love is Armstrong’s ability to create such complete moments with such economy of language. The characters are so well cared for; there is such love present in the writing and it makes for such a beautiful journey to take."

--Kevin Kerr, Jessie and Governor General's Award winning playwright as well as a director, actor, and founding member of the Electric Company



For more information, contact UNBC Press.