About the Author:
Tom Wayman was born in Ontario in 1945, but has spent most of his life in British Columbia. He has worked at a number of jobs, both blue and white-collar, across Canada and the U.S., and has helped bring into being a new movement of poetry in these countries--the incorporation of the actual conditions and effects of daily work. His poetry has been awarded the Canadian Authors' Association medal for poetry, the A.J.M. Smith Prize, first prize in the USA Bicentennial Poetry Awards competition, and the Acorn-Plantos Award; in 2003 he was shortlisted for the Governor-General's Literary Award. He has published more than a dozen collections of poems, six poetry anthologies, three collections of essays and three books of prose fiction. He has taught widely at the post-secondary level in Canada and the U.S., most recently (2002-2010) at the University of Calgary. Since 1989 he has been the Squire of "Appledore," his estate in the Selkirk Mountains of southeastern BC.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:
THE RESURRECTION OF THE CLOWN
Once she died
she stopped changing
and became so clear
she could reemerge
-- her bright brittle spunkiness
her off-key songs
her delight in balloons
her dogged
practicing
of tap dance
how her body closes in
when she makes love
her limbs and thighs
and face
concentrating
on joy
These aspects of her
and more
week after week
appeared to
members of the Clown Society
who whispered
about the phenomenon
And former members of her audience
noticed an event
a motion
their memory pulled and twisted
until they could name
where they encountered
her
In this manner
she was reassembled
in other existences
part
by part
until she was reborn
with her own mind
altered by the lessons
death teaches
to the living
ANTHEM: UNDER THE HORNED MOON
Often the crescent moon
sails stiffly vertical
Other times it floats
almost on its back
This night
I am driving 1-84 west down Gorges
into the open arms
of a horizontal horn of light
During my years
beneath the moon's phases
I, anxious and exhilarated,
have steadily felt the road
coming toward me like a spoon
toward a baby
the asphalt pouring under the vehicle's
hood, front bumper
The highway's distances
feed me
As I cover ground,
I am simutaneously racing closer
and away
The motion perfect
perfectly lonely
like this moon
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.