issue ten: guest-edited by Jenny Penberthy

NOW AVAILABLE: G U E S T #10

edited by Jenny Penberthy

see here for Jenny’s introduction

the tenth issue features new work by:

Mallory Amirault

Otoniya Juliane Okot Bitek

Junie Désil

Mackenzie Ground

Lida Nosrati

Christopher Tubbs

Ian Williams

$5 + postage / + $1 for Canadian orders; + $2 for US; + $6 outside of North America

Canadian/American/International rates (including shipping

Canadian orders $6.00 CAD American orders $7.00 CAD International orders $11.00 CAD

Contributor Notes

Born in Mi'kma'ki, Nova Scotia, Mallory Amirault is an artist whose Acadian and Mi'kmaq ancestry belongs to the Gespugwi’tg district of Yarmouth, otherwise known as the lobster’s ass when referring to the shape of the province. Currently living as a guest on unceded Coast Salish territories of the Skwxwú7mesh, xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ nations, her artistic practice engages with critical poetics and literary performance. “Brine” appears in The Capilano Review 3.36

Otoniya Juliane Okot Bitek is an Acholi woman. Her 100 Days (University of Alberta 2016) a book of poetry that reflects on the meaning of memory two decades after the Rwanda genocide, was nominated for several writing prizes including the 2017 BC Book Prize, the Pat Lowther Award, the 2017 Alberta Book Awards and the 2017 Canadian Authors Award for Poetry. It won the 2017 IndieFab Book of the Year Award for poetry and the 2017 Glenna Luschei Prize for African Poetry. Otoniya’s poem “Migration: Salt Stories” was shortlisted for the 2017 National Magazine Awards for Poetry in Canada. Her poem “Gauntlet” was longlisted for the 2018 CBC Poetry Prize and is the title of her most recent work, a chapbook with the same title from Nomados Press (2019). She completed her PhD at the University of British Columbia, in October 2019. “Something” appears in The Capilano Review 3.38.

Junie Désil is a poet who has performed at various literary events and festivals. Her work has appeared in Room Magazine, PRISM International, The Capilano Review and CV2. Junie's forthcoming debut poetry collection Eat Salt |Gaze At The Ocean will be published in 2020 by Talon Books. Junie currently works in a non-profit, women-serving organization on the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ (Unceded & Ancestral Musqueam, Squamish & Tsleil-Waututh territories) and lives on Qayqayt First Nation (New Westminster), juggling writing and life. “How to Write about Zombies” appears in The Capilano Review 3.39.

Mackenzie Ground is a nehiyawiskwew and a writer from Enoch Cree Nation and Edmonton, Alberta, Treaty Six. She currently lives, works, and studies on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish), səl̓ilw̓ətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh), xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), and kʷikʷəƛ ̓ əm (Kwikwetlem) peoples as a PhD student at Simon Fraser University in the Department of English. She is a member of the Writing Revolution in Place research collective, and her writing has appeared in The Glass Buffalo and The Capilano Review. She is thankful for the support of her family, her friends, and her sweethearts: her partner and her cat. “mend in the balsam” and “breaths of love” appear in The Capilano Review 3.32.

Lida Nosrati is a word worker whose writing and translations of contemporary Iranian poetry and short fiction have appeared in Matters of Feminist Practice, The Capilano Review, PRISM International, The Apostles Review, Words Without Border, Anomaly, and elsewhere. She lives in Toronto. “In the interest of time” appears in The Capilano Review 3.32.

Christopher Tubbs, like his mother, is a member of the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation. He is moved by the hardships that his family has endured on the reserve and in the residential school system. Their experiences inspire nearly all of his work. Some of his works have previously appeared in The Capilano Review, and his work was featured in The Best Canadian Poetry in English 2018, published by Tightrope Books. He lives on Qayqayt territory in New Westminster, BC. “CUSTOMS DECLARATION TO A WHITE EMPIRE” appears in The Capilano Review 3.31.

Ian Williams is the author of Reproduction, winner of the 2019 Scotiabank Giller Prize. His poetry collection, Personals, was shortlisted for the Griffin Poetry Prize. His short story collection, Not Anyone’s Anything, won the Danuta Gleed Literary Award for the best first collection of short fiction in Canada. His first book, You Know Who You Are, was a finalist for the ReLit Poetry Prize. He is a trustee of the Griffin Poetry Prize. Williams teaches poetry at the University of British Columbia. “Where are you really from” and “Tu me manques” appear in The Capilano Review 3.34.

Jenny Penberthy : issue ten : Introduction

Based on my seven years as editor of The Capilano Review, rob has summoned me to edit an issue of G U E S T. My editorial homing instincts take me right back to the pages of TCR.

From its start in 1972, TCR’s commitment has been to seeking out and publishing experimental art and writing. None of that has changed, but the rupture in 2015 from our most secure source of funding pitched us into independent status and unfamiliar vulnerability. In the upheaval we discovered new connections that reshaped and refreshed our sense of community. And what amazing poems our editors have been finding.

For this issue, I’ve returned to the TCRs published since the move to downtown quarters and sought out the poets whose work arrested me at the time of publication and that I’m still returning to now. Many thanks to them for agreeing to be reprinted here.

And to le maître, rob mclennan, the poetry community owes you immeasurable gratitude. 

Jenny Penberthy is a former editor of The Capilano Review and the current Chair of the Capilano Review Contemporary Arts Society. Her work as an editor has also focused on the poetry of Lorine Niedecker. She edited Niedecker’s poems – New Goose (Listening Chamber, 2003), Lorine Niedecker: Collected Works (University of California Press, 2002), and Harpsichord and Salt Fish (Pig Press, 1991) – and her letters – Niedecker and the Correspondence with Zukofsky 1931-1970 (Cambridge University Press, 1993) – along with a collection of essays, Lorine Niedecker: Woman and Poet (National Poetry Foundation, University of Maine, 1996). In 2016 she edited Kenneth Cox: The Art of Language for Flood Editions in Chicago. Currently, she is working on a collection of previously unpublished Niedecker letters and on a book about Fulcrum Press.