What the Soul Doesn't Want

By Lorna Crozier

In her newest collection, Lorna Crozier describes the passage of time in the way that only she can. Her arresting, edgy poems about aging and grief are surprising and invigorating: a defiant balm. At the same time, she revels in the quirkiness and whimsy of the natural world: the vision of a fly, the naming of an eggplant, and a woman who — not unhappily — finds that cockroaches are drawn to her.

“God draws a life. And then rubs it out / with the eraser on his pencil.” Lorna Crozier draws a world in What the Soul Doesn’t Want, and then beckons us in. Crozier’s signature wit and striking imagery are on display as she stretches her wings and reminds us that we haven’t yet seen all that she can do.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Freehand Books
• Release date: May 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9781988298139

Lorna Crozier

Lorna Crozier, an Officer of the Order of Canada, is the author of sixteen previous books of poetry, most recently The Wrong Cat and The Wild in You. She is also the author of The Book of Marvels: A Compendium of Ordinary Things and the memoir Small Beneath the Sky. She is a Professor Emerita at the University of Victoria, has been awarded the Governor General’s Award for Poetry, and is a three-time recipient of the Pat Lowther Award. Born in Swift Current, she now lives on Vancouver Island with writer Patrick Lane and two fine cats.

Book preview

Not the Tongue

We planted the buddleia bush

for butterflies, the hemlock

to give sorrow a place to rest.

Chekhov teaches us how to dress

for death. A corpse with gloves on.

Sorrow bends

the hemlock boughs

but doesn’t break them.

That’s the second lesson.

Did you know

it’s the butterflies’ feet

that taste the nectar?

We give the tongue

too much credence. It makes us

loose and daft.

What the Soul Wants

A horse made out of rain (it doesn’t need a blacksmith).

A fret of dragonflies, the thin glass of their wings.

A yellow bicycle. Outside the door

a tall coffee can full of sand for the soul’s gritty habits.

A place where the trees are happy. How can you tell?

It’s the smell they give back to the world.

When the Bones Get Cold

My husband sends me hummingbirds

from his eyes. Only he and I know

he’s going blind. For him, I don’t get old.

His fingers, chapped from gardening, sand my skin,

bring out the grain he cannot see.

I am made beautiful by loss. The moon, too,

grows more far-sighted. Its light compliments:

the smallest birds don’t disagree. There’s a sweetness

that comes from accepting what I