Happy Poetry Month!

We recently made a wonderful new discovery: April is poetry month! What a lovely event to celebrate and what better way to celebrate than to give homage to our lovely collaborator, poet Erin Robinsong. Erin has been the resident poet for Swallowing Clouds, tpdp’s Dance and Literary Program in the Toronto Public Libraries, since its inception. Her poetry acts as a springboard for the kids’ creation of movement, music, visual art, and poetry of their own. She also collaborated on Magnetic Fields. 

Erin is soon to publish a new collection of poetry and in honor of poetry month we asked her to share a piece from the book, both in written and audio format. Please have a read or listen and enjoy the special magic of Erin Robinsong. Check back for more information about her upcoming book!

Organ

Flickering
gun-shy dark
sensations,
illustrious soft machine,
looped, most proximal
Do you even know
What part of you you are?*

Chemist programmer waste management prodigy
structural analyst shamanic kinetic engineer
I’m not. My open palms, disorganized dreams
wild chemicals
ruin the mood
ruin sunlight, lace
boots up and stare at

shapes that
will not assemble or account for this
whipped black chrysalis
uncut and mixed with math
in liquid dendritic branches, whirling
orchestra of alert butter by which

You stare at the day, resplendent
in your lack of plans, your unrhymed
desires, free to dabble in doubt
while the virtuoso, the polymath
of you makes way, makes
way

Erin Robinsong is a poet and interdisciplinary artist based in Toronto. This spring her work can also be found in Tag: Canadian Poets at Play, The Capilano Review, Canadian Xstasy, The Goose, and onstage at Artscape Youngplace. She teaches writing at Humber College, in the Toronto Public libraries with Swallowing Clouds, and online with Story is a State of Mind. Her first book of poems is forthcoming with Bookthug.

To read more about Erin’s art making and background you can go back into our blog archives!

Erin is also presenting her collaborative work This Ritual is not an Accident (co-created with Andréa de Keizer) this weekend at Artscape Youngplace; April 24-26 at 8 p.m.

Sadly for us Erin will be relocating to Montreal in May. We will miss her very much but are grateful that Montreal is only a train ride away and most definitely hope to keep our collaborative relationship strong in all the ways we can.

P.S. Our next Swallowing Clouds sessions will take place at Oakwood Public Library, Wednesday and Thursday afterschool: May 20^th – June 13^th and at Coxwell Danforth Public Library on Saturday mornings April 25^th – June 13^th.