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Maki by Candace de Taeye

Salmon flesh laid
upon the rice, then bound up tightly
becomes maki.

Arms and the top corner
folded down, one side tucked in,
The midwife demonstrates
an effective swaddle.

Regularly binding
their breasts flat, growing stubble
my sister becomes your uncle.

Candace de Taeye, the oldest of four, was born near Guelph and raised in Bowmanville, Ontario. Candace earned her Bachelor of Science from the University of Toronto and a Diploma of Paramedicine from Centennial College. Her science background bleeds into her art, so readers often stumble across words found more frequently in an anatomy and physiology textbook than a poetry chapbook. The chapbook Roe prominently features a salmon ladder found in downtown Bowmanville. Candace creates suites or series of poems that play with the same concept. Just as much time is spent collecting the ideas, words, images and phrases, as is spent arranging and working them into poems. The collection of poems is tied together by repeating words or phrases and, as a collection, the poems work together to expand on the original theme or metaphor. Roe explores the themes of salmon, changing body physiologies, feeding, naming, horses, cicadas, and rabbits.

Roe is available from PSGuelph. Candace will also launch a new collection of poems in early November called Small Planes and the Dead Fathers of Lovers from Vocamus Press.

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