Abstract

In my thesis I have written a collection of poems determined by a gridded map of my memory
of Belleville Ontario. The map is a grid made of equilateral triangles assigned to letters in a
regulated pattern. The poems move across the surface of the grid and, in that process, each
facet of the grid is nominated as a corresponding concept divided from the total Belleville. The
poems playfully explore the conflation of the municipal and modernist grids by having bodies
navigate my abstracted space and the actual space of Belleville simultaneously. The ambiguity
between situation and abstraction corresponds with the current state of Belleville. There is
now a booming tourist industry on the Bay of Quinte. Positioned along the often flooding
water, Belleville’s future is contingent on capitalist speculation and climate change. The
poems use different configurations of triangles across the grid to prompt multiple poetic
forms. There are many instances of coordinates reoccurring in these virtual derivés, an
expression of their situation as well as the multiple paths being taken.