Susan McCaslin’s Heart Work
Review by Patrick Jamieson, Victoria
Volume 35 Issue 1, 2 & 3 | Posted: April 4, 2021
This is a great little book of poetry by probably the most prolific and successful Christian literary writer in Canada, Susan McCaslin, much reviewed and reported on in ICN, and the author of 16 books of award winning prose and poetry.
This one is very timely with an apt title for this contemplative period of history we are visiting, courtesy of the public health response to a very bad flu.
Elsewhere in this edition are two of her poems, the title one ‘Heart Work’ (p.5) and a riff on the flu itself titled ‘Corona Corona.’ (p. 7) Susan again demonstrates a capacity for both accessibility to the regular reader and an eloquence worthy of an frequent and elevated award winner. There are four sections to the 83-page volume published by Ekstasis Editions of Victoria.
The final section, Corona Corona, follows ‘Caribou Fires 2017,’ which anticipated the current environmental catastrophe represented by COVID-19. This is a brilliantly coloured photo poetry essay on her direct experience of the threat and partial destruction of her husband’s family camp on Lake Young near Ashcroft in the Caribou region nearly four years ago now. The post fire photography is remarkable as a statement of the coming and ongoing crisis.
A poetic reflection on the letters of John Keats, titled Negative Capability Suite, follows her opening section Songs for Hildegard of Bingen, the 12th Century Mystic. Heart Work is the final poem in this section. It accentuates the spiritual work evoked in this era, “where the arts are heart arts: pure acts of the educated hear.”
Susan McCaslin’s book rewards the reader in a manner suited to these odd but interesting times from the spiritual perspective.
Review by Patrick Jamieson, Victoria