Abstract

Near Here is a collection of narrative and lyric poems that probe the speakers' familial relationships. In the poems of the first section, the speakers range from reflective to desperate in their attempts to reconcile the past with the present. These poems give way to the narrative long poem that chronicles a young woman's effort to grapple with the death of a past lover. A short series of dream poems echoes the sense of uneasiness in the previous two sections and prefaces the profound sadness that the speaker of the final long poem, "Near north", faces. The speaker in this final long poem is confronted with the harsh and mesmerizing setting of Saskatchewan's north; she is compelled to project her own sense of futility and anxiety onto the daunting natural landscape of her new, temporary home. Through the changing seasons of this foreign environment, this final poem recognizes the renewal that could not be gleaned from the details of memory.