The writer treads carefully in North American standstill sites.<\/p>\n
\u201cStandstill: A Hopewell Earthworks Daybook and Other Essays\u201d<\/p>\n
By Bruce Rice<\/p>\n
Published by Long Road Press<\/p>\n
$20.00 ISBN 9781068949708<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve long admired the breadth of Bruce Rice\u2019s sophisticated poetry, and now, with the publication of Standstill: A Hopewell Earthworks Daybook and Other Essays, I can attest that his creative nonfiction is equally diverse \u2014 and even more satisfying. In his new five-part collection, Saskatchewan\u2019s former Poet Laureate explores various types of language and art\u2019s life-saving abilities; presents a poetic and sensitive travelogue as he crosses the border to explore the 2000-year-old Hopewell Earthworks (sites aligned with the lunar standstill, long sacred to Indigenous peoples) and transports us to the ICU-bedside vigil for his deaf sister in Nova Scotia.<\/p>\n
This award-winning Regina scribe \u2014 oft-praised for his painterly use of light and shadow \u2014 continues to raise the bar with poetic evocations of these elements, as well.<\/p>\n
Rice explains that \u201cthe prairie creature in [him] is drawn to the farthest edges of a place,\u201d and a 2012 trip to Scotland\u2019s Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, to appreciate the Standing Stones of Callanish sparked his desire to experience one of the \u201cthree known Native American standstill sites.\u201d These journeys are pilgrimages, and the writer treads carefully:<\/p>\n
what can I say to a spirit\u2019s repose<\/p>\n
it\u2019s not the language<\/p>\n
that matters<\/p>\n
Much of the book concerns his 2017 Ohio journey to the Octagon and Observatory Circle \u2014 \u201cpart of a series of massive geometric sites built by people of the Hopewell culture\u201d \u2014 and other sacred sites. I was impressed with Rice\u2019s candour \u2014 ie: his fear that \u201cThis whole trip could be a disaster\u201d \u2014 and his philosophical queries: \u201c \u2026 what if [our imagination] travels without us, sailing the Earth on its own wind?\u201d From elevated thoughts to cheap hotels and \u201ca half-finished breakfast wrap,\u201d he authentically engages, and senses when he\u2019s not welcome: \u201cwaist-high tangle blocks every step. I don\u2019t think it wants me here.\u201d<\/p>\n
And let\u2019s not forget irony. \u201cAmerica loves its disasters,\u201d Rice writes, yet \u201cThe Hopewell dead show no signs of battle. What they built was the result of a remarkable collectivity.\u201d Also this: the Moundbuilders Country Club is built over the site of the Octagon Observatory Circle; visitors are allowed just four days a year.<\/p>\n
Confessions abound, ie: \u201cI\u2019m not sure how to be in a country where everything sees me\u201d. Yet everywhere, pockets of beauty, ie: a \u201crefugium of asters\/coneflowers dialing the sun\u201d and revelations of language: \u201cmarks in the land are a language\u201d and \u201cthe river\u2019s like a voice that wants me to follow it.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s much tenderness, including AP photographer Chick Harrity\u2019s story about capturing his life-changing \u201cBaby in a box\u201d photo, and the transformative power a painting held for actor\/comedian Bill Murray.<\/p>\n
Does life put us in the path of the people, places and art we\u2019re meant to meet? I believe so, and it\u2019s possible that we don\u2019t even know how often we\u2019re saved.<\/p>\n
Sometimes the light is \u201ctoo fragile,\u201d but, as Rice understands, light works both ways, and all praise to him for also paying eloquent tribute to \u201cthe light that finds its way out of us.\u201d<\/p>\n
This book is available at your local bookstore or from www.skbooks.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The writer treads carefully in North American standstill sites. \u201cStandstill: A Hopewell Earthworks Daybook and Other Essays\u201d By…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11462,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[353,49,48,75,9529],"class_list":["post-11461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-books","tag-books","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-saskatoon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}