A Sense of Place

"A Sense of Place" is a collection of short poems inspired by places around the world. The table of contents is arranged alphabetically by countries and cities that inspired the works, but often there is a certain intertextuality at play as a poem about Thailand might hold Canadian content, or a poem about the Dubai sand, recalls a woman’s skin from Bangkok.From Bangkok to Barcelona, from London to Laos, from Singapore to Switzerland, this global perspective of ideas inspired by places is as broad in form as it is in content: A grasshopper in the Peloponnese reminds the speaker of a sweltering summer in the Okanagan region of British Columbia, Canada. Paris inspires a ditty about brief love affair, and nothing more. The confines of Singapore make the speaker reminisce about the lack of confines in Bangkok. A lonely Canadian working at a resort in Verbier, Switzerland, brings forth a locals’ view of the expat worker.