Poetry As Good As Sin
by Richard Stevenson
Some poetic voices take a longer time to evolve than others. They steep or grow in character like a good wine or scotch. The elegiac mode, the self-deprecating wit, the quirky sense of humour, and the eye for detail you need to slip from anecdote to concise incandescent lyric aren’t attributes you find in younger poets’ work very often. But they are attributes Terence Young exhibits in abundance. As the title implies, The Island in Winter is a deeply reflective, meditative work: a chronicle of childhood, family, marriage, and middle-age dreams. The fact that this is the author’s first book may come as a surprise, for it certainly doesn’t read like one. It’s not a box of licorice all sorts; there is nothing in it that smacks of the inkwell or creative writing workshop; and it contains none of the usual set pieces, imitative five-finger exercises, or poetic stumblings and pratfalls the reader may have come to expect in first books. The voice is assured, the poet confident and skilled; none of the considerable technique exceeds the grasp. Yet the writing is playful and full of delightful surprises, too. I particularly like the way the book begins. The title of the first poem sounds like a set piece: one of those serious meditative exercises serious British, middle-aged poets are supposed to engage in when taking stock of a wayward youth, or acknowledging genetic endowments and parental wisdom—“Ten Years After His Death I Examine a Few Lessons My Father Taught Me”. It could be a deliberate parody of a romantic frisson, and it sets the reader up for a humorous treatment of the subject; but it doesn’t stop there. What we get is a loose assemblage of fractured adages, quirky witticisms, and firmly held prejudices and beliefs—the kind of hand-me-down effluvia of advice we remember and cherish our fathers for: A cheese slice is not a slice of cheese. Red sky at night means nothing. Close all gates behind you. Hemp has more honour than nylon, but any rope is your friend. Buy British. Neatly arranged triplet stanzas reinforce the wit. However, the zany fortune-cookie zen, the arbitrary selection, and the comic juxtapositions don’t create the expected caricature or leave the reader nodding in amusement. Instead, the ending, with its shorter, crisper lines, introduces a note of quiet desperation, and quietly pulls the rug out from under our feet: Sex is your own affair. Always pay cash. Visit the dead. The loving portrait delivers a double whammy in indicating the debt, but also delivering the news that a man’s principles, finally, are the only bulwark against the time and tide. What we end up with is both a quirky elegy and a sly kind of ars poetica. A paraphrase might go something like this: pay attention to the day-to-day; life is lived in the details; the arrangement is everything, choose carefully; listen attentively; derive your metaphors from real events and careful observation; the way to art is through the craft. It’s a lesson the poet has learned well, and one he passes on in his own self-assured explorations. Terrence Young has clearly learned his craft and wastes nothing. The rest of the book documents both the requisite middle-aged look-over-the-shoulders and the vicissitudes, responsibilities, and joys of the dedicated husband, parent, lover, good neighbour, and family man at the point when his children are a little older and there’s suddenly a little more room and time for romance and home improvements. The island of the title is Vancouver Island; the other poet is, of course, Patricia Young; the marriage, a good one. While the ecstatic moments may come in a distant second to the more muted pleasures of reflection, acceptance, even acquiescence, the joys are unexpected, full, and rich: Let us gather round our coffee tables. Let us hunker down one more time over the photo albums, those ambassadors from months gone by. There we are in Tuscany, Provence. This one through the shower window: is that the Mediterranean that gleams at the end of a valley? And see, where steam from a vegetable stew clouds our picture window? Last winter a boy wrote his name across its surface and, look, there it is again. (“Seasonal Affective Disorder In The Middle Years”) This is a wonderful collection of joyful meditations in lyric narrative mode. The bulk of the poems are written in free verse strophes, but the occasional prose poem and exploration of parallel syntax in open form lyric add spice to the mix. Music and image are splendidly handled throughout, and Young is especially adept at creating the telling image (“skin cool as peeled willow”, “biker’s leathered hands flex/and unflex/like two greyhounds/about to eat up a track.”). An auspicious beginning indeed. I must confess, hearing my son rave about his English teacher and seeing the work he put into co-founding and helping sustain The Claremont Review have led me to expect this book for some time now. I’m grateful it has arrived; doubtless his students have been the beneficiaries of the man’s talent for years.
"Young is a storyteller and his ability to marry storylines to strongly crafted, richly imaged poetry, is a rare gift, indeed. [...] The Island In Winter is a truly remarkable first book and, by blending his considerable expertise as both fiction writer and poet, Young has made sure that it is one that can be read and appreciated by anyone who enjoys truly fine writing."
—Ronnie R. Brown, Canadian Bookseller
"Young's work is sure-footed and entertaining, and he's adept with humour, at times using it to ground romanticism. ...This is a book that will have a wide range of appeal; even those readers not normally drawn to poetry will enjoy the poet's compassionate, forthright, and fresh vision. ...Young is an exceptional poet, and he's only going to get better."
—Kelly Parsons, Malahat Review
"This is a wonderful collection of joyful meditations in lyric narrative mode. The bulk of the poems are written in free verse strophes, but the occasional prose poem and exploration of parallel syntax in open form lyric add spice to the mix. Music and image are splendidly handled throughout, and Young is especially adept at creating the telling image. An auspicius beginning indeed." —Richard Stevenson, Books in Canada
The Island in Winter
by Terence Young
Signal Editions/Vehicule Press, 1999 Review by Michael Bryson
The Island in Winter brings to life Terence Young's tragic, tender voice. The poems are often elegies. The subjects include the narrator's late father, lost relationships, childhood, and simple innocence. These are poems about the process of maturing, the process of coming to terms with life.
From "Grip":
... the winners of this world
are neither the most intelligent
nor the wealthiest
but those who can hang on the longest.
There's a memory I have of my father
in his last days
a man who knew he was slipping
how he took comfort in the Volvo I drove back then
embracing its overbuilt passenger handle
as though it were a stair railing or the steel
stanchion of a sailing ship
strong enough to console a man at the end of his life ...
Young's language is simple and direct. His strongest effects leverage the depth of his honesty, his courage to confront the deeper currents of life. The poems do not reach for pyrotechnics, nor do they attempt the false "realism" of too many over earnest, over gritty would-be Buksowskis. If there is magic in his garden (and there is), it comes from a close examination of life's common dramas.
For example, from "Letters to an Absent Wife":
I've been thinking of taking a lover,
especially now the apples are falling
and the last of our ducks has been carried off.
I can think of nothing else while such lust
surrounds me. ...
They say the earth is spinning
but I believe it's falling.
The speed takes my breath away.
Here, as in many of Young's poems, his narrative strategy is to place the reader in common territory (a love triangle), then to spin off metaphors and observations. The poem reaches from the mundane (fallen apples) to the cosmic (the speed of the universe), knitting together an experience which is both transcendent and grounding.
The poems in this collection both resonate with depth and reach for the stars.
by Richard Stevenson
Some poetic voices take a longer time to evolve than others. They steep or grow in character like a good wine or scotch. The elegiac mode, the self-deprecating wit, the quirky sense of humour, and the eye for detail you need to slip from anecdote to concise incandescent lyric aren’t attributes you find in younger poets’ work very often. But they are attributes Terence Young exhibits in abundance. As the title implies, The Island in Winter is a deeply reflective, meditative work: a chronicle of childhood, family, marriage, and middle-age dreams. The fact that this is the author’s first book may come as a surprise, for it certainly doesn’t read like one. It’s not a box of licorice all sorts; there is nothing in it that smacks of the inkwell or creative writing workshop; and it contains none of the usual set pieces, imitative five-finger exercises, or poetic stumblings and pratfalls the reader may have come to expect in first books. The voice is assured, the poet confident and skilled; none of the considerable technique exceeds the grasp. Yet the writing is playful and full of delightful surprises, too. I particularly like the way the book begins. The title of the first poem sounds like a set piece: one of those serious meditative exercises serious British, middle-aged poets are supposed to engage in when taking stock of a wayward youth, or acknowledging genetic endowments and parental wisdom—“Ten Years After His Death I Examine a Few Lessons My Father Taught Me”. It could be a deliberate parody of a romantic frisson, and it sets the reader up for a humorous treatment of the subject; but it doesn’t stop there. What we get is a loose assemblage of fractured adages, quirky witticisms, and firmly held prejudices and beliefs—the kind of hand-me-down effluvia of advice we remember and cherish our fathers for: A cheese slice is not a slice of cheese. Red sky at night means nothing. Close all gates behind you. Hemp has more honour than nylon, but any rope is your friend. Buy British. Neatly arranged triplet stanzas reinforce the wit. However, the zany fortune-cookie zen, the arbitrary selection, and the comic juxtapositions don’t create the expected caricature or leave the reader nodding in amusement. Instead, the ending, with its shorter, crisper lines, introduces a note of quiet desperation, and quietly pulls the rug out from under our feet: Sex is your own affair. Always pay cash. Visit the dead. The loving portrait delivers a double whammy in indicating the debt, but also delivering the news that a man’s principles, finally, are the only bulwark against the time and tide. What we end up with is both a quirky elegy and a sly kind of ars poetica. A paraphrase might go something like this: pay attention to the day-to-day; life is lived in the details; the arrangement is everything, choose carefully; listen attentively; derive your metaphors from real events and careful observation; the way to art is through the craft. It’s a lesson the poet has learned well, and one he passes on in his own self-assured explorations. Terrence Young has clearly learned his craft and wastes nothing. The rest of the book documents both the requisite middle-aged look-over-the-shoulders and the vicissitudes, responsibilities, and joys of the dedicated husband, parent, lover, good neighbour, and family man at the point when his children are a little older and there’s suddenly a little more room and time for romance and home improvements. The island of the title is Vancouver Island; the other poet is, of course, Patricia Young; the marriage, a good one. While the ecstatic moments may come in a distant second to the more muted pleasures of reflection, acceptance, even acquiescence, the joys are unexpected, full, and rich: Let us gather round our coffee tables. Let us hunker down one more time over the photo albums, those ambassadors from months gone by. There we are in Tuscany, Provence. This one through the shower window: is that the Mediterranean that gleams at the end of a valley? And see, where steam from a vegetable stew clouds our picture window? Last winter a boy wrote his name across its surface and, look, there it is again. (“Seasonal Affective Disorder In The Middle Years”) This is a wonderful collection of joyful meditations in lyric narrative mode. The bulk of the poems are written in free verse strophes, but the occasional prose poem and exploration of parallel syntax in open form lyric add spice to the mix. Music and image are splendidly handled throughout, and Young is especially adept at creating the telling image (“skin cool as peeled willow”, “biker’s leathered hands flex/and unflex/like two greyhounds/about to eat up a track.”). An auspicious beginning indeed. I must confess, hearing my son rave about his English teacher and seeing the work he put into co-founding and helping sustain The Claremont Review have led me to expect this book for some time now. I’m grateful it has arrived; doubtless his students have been the beneficiaries of the man’s talent for years.
"Young is a storyteller and his ability to marry storylines to strongly crafted, richly imaged poetry, is a rare gift, indeed. [...] The Island In Winter is a truly remarkable first book and, by blending his considerable expertise as both fiction writer and poet, Young has made sure that it is one that can be read and appreciated by anyone who enjoys truly fine writing."
—Ronnie R. Brown, Canadian Bookseller
"Young's work is sure-footed and entertaining, and he's adept with humour, at times using it to ground romanticism. ...This is a book that will have a wide range of appeal; even those readers not normally drawn to poetry will enjoy the poet's compassionate, forthright, and fresh vision. ...Young is an exceptional poet, and he's only going to get better."
—Kelly Parsons, Malahat Review
"This is a wonderful collection of joyful meditations in lyric narrative mode. The bulk of the poems are written in free verse strophes, but the occasional prose poem and exploration of parallel syntax in open form lyric add spice to the mix. Music and image are splendidly handled throughout, and Young is especially adept at creating the telling image. An auspicius beginning indeed." —Richard Stevenson, Books in Canada
The Island in Winter
by Terence Young
Signal Editions/Vehicule Press, 1999 Review by Michael Bryson
The Island in Winter brings to life Terence Young's tragic, tender voice. The poems are often elegies. The subjects include the narrator's late father, lost relationships, childhood, and simple innocence. These are poems about the process of maturing, the process of coming to terms with life.
From "Grip":
... the winners of this world
are neither the most intelligent
nor the wealthiest
but those who can hang on the longest.
There's a memory I have of my father
in his last days
a man who knew he was slipping
how he took comfort in the Volvo I drove back then
embracing its overbuilt passenger handle
as though it were a stair railing or the steel
stanchion of a sailing ship
strong enough to console a man at the end of his life ...
Young's language is simple and direct. His strongest effects leverage the depth of his honesty, his courage to confront the deeper currents of life. The poems do not reach for pyrotechnics, nor do they attempt the false "realism" of too many over earnest, over gritty would-be Buksowskis. If there is magic in his garden (and there is), it comes from a close examination of life's common dramas.
For example, from "Letters to an Absent Wife":
I've been thinking of taking a lover,
especially now the apples are falling
and the last of our ducks has been carried off.
I can think of nothing else while such lust
surrounds me. ...
They say the earth is spinning
but I believe it's falling.
The speed takes my breath away.
Here, as in many of Young's poems, his narrative strategy is to place the reader in common territory (a love triangle), then to spin off metaphors and observations. The poem reaches from the mundane (fallen apples) to the cosmic (the speed of the universe), knitting together an experience which is both transcendent and grounding.
The poems in this collection both resonate with depth and reach for the stars.
