At a time of cultural change for Indigenous people that feels relentlessly tidal and epochal, For the Changing Moon: Poems and Songs records the ebb and flow of what it is to live here and now in Canada, as a woman, an indigenous woman, a culturally mixed woman, a daughter, a mother, a peace-seeker and a warrior.
The book includes work visually designed for the page, and work composed to be chanted, sung, and spoken amongst ourselves. We are asked to experience it as a record of the shifting times, and understand how the mood of the world can strike change in an individual, sometimes, like a rogue wave; and other times, slowly and methodically like a lunar tidal pull.
If you can do this Can you, Can you do this?
If we can do this, Can we? Can we do this?
Anna Marie Sewell's poems court performance as they incorporate the energy of slam and employ the beat structures of chant. They encourage us to enter their spells and incantations always built with an ear for sound and with an eye for images of dream and wonder. Her invite and challenge is clear: "Come lovers of language, seekers of change, moon-mad prophets, come. Read and share these poems and songs, and answer them back with your own."
From this specific place, Canada, during a moment of global sea change, these poems and songs reach for the moon-mad natural soul in all of us, that part of all of us that lives to follow the Great Song.
About the Author: Anna Marie Sewell writes at prairiepomes.com. Her poetry is part of the Ukrainian Shumka Dancers production Ancestors&Elders (world premiere April 27). Her debut collection, Fifth World Drum (Frontenac Press, 2009) will be joined in September by For the Changing Moon (Thistledown Press). Anna Marie was Edmonton's 4th Poet Laureate (2011‒13), and created The Poem Catcher public art installation at City Hall. She curated over 1,000 pages of community writing collected there, posted at webofvisions.wordpress.com.
A multi-disciplinary artist, Anna Marie's practice centres on collaborative projects, and her writing plays across boundaries of language, culture, and worldview.
Recent work has appeared in:
Ancestors & Elders, cross-cultural, multi-disciplinary collaborative Dance Theatre show, produced by Ukrainian Shumka Dancers, world premiere April 27, 2018, at Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium. Sewell composed the spoken word narrative poetry, in addition to her role as Story Consultant.
Eighteen Bridges magazine, family history essay, originally titled "Coming to Canada: A Gardener's Meditation," published as "The Truth Is in the Dirt."
The Yards magazine, mini-history, "The Legend of the Lane," to be reprinted in April, 2018, in Alberta Views.
Stroll of Poets 2018, Anthology, due out March 25.
Rubaboo Festival, 2017: Wide Awake for 30 Years--excerpts from poetry/essay project, a personal/social history of 1985‒2015: spoken word / theatre / song
Reconciling Edmonton, multidisciplinary community history project first produced in 2015, currently still on tour.
Writing the City: Poets Laureate of Edmonton, 2005‒2013 (Edmonton Arts Council, D. Barbour, editor, 2012): 4 poems, 1 essay, plus curation of 4 poems by community poets.
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