"So began my search for Jean Armour. Over the next couple of years I read many biographies about Burns as well as his extensive collections of letters, poems, and songs, trying to piece together a picture of Jean from the fragments written about her. She emerged as a footnote in the life of the poet, a blurry image that wouldn’t come into focus, a stereotype of the devoted, long-suffering wife."
Read More"We also see a distorted concept of loyalty in intimate groups, in families, cliques and communities. For example, one person might break up with their girlfriend, and expect their friends to be mean to their girlfriend. But in fact that’s the opposite of loyalty—real friendship and real loyalty and love means helping people negotiate and helping people be self-critical. The problem now is that we have a very high bar that must be reached to be eligible for compassion."
Read More"We both had experiences where I’d go into a music store or a video store when I was younger and I was really excited about something. I’d bring it up to the counter and I’d be vibrating with excitement cause it was that cool and then I’d just get a ton of shade. We were like “I don’t wanna replicate that experience.” We wanna try to do something different and we try to be low-key."
Read MoreI love the worlds we build with other people through language—how letters, poems, text messages, emails are not only evidence of our rapports, but they also actively shape them. Each relationship has its own vocabulary and texture and I like to think epistolary poems allow me to pay tribute to those idiosyncrasies. It’s also a way to conjure the addressee; it creates a wormhole that doesn’t exactly bring that person closer, but it does bring into relief that realm you’ve created together.
Read MoreRead Local BC is back again this year—and if you haven’t yet heard about this initiative spearheaded by the Association of Book Publishers of BC—then clear your calendar from now 'til November 7th.
Read More“Stevie chewed on her straw and peered up at the stage through her long bangs. “Look at the saliva,” she said. “It's free-flowing.” // “No regrets,” I said. “YOLO, or whatever.” // “Oh, to be loved like that,” said Stevie. “Not.”// This was a last minute New Year’s plan.”
Read More“Your American pals
were orphans in the Pacific,
fighting with filial piety
and no instructions. What games
did you play with them as the vicious
assault on their morale hummed on”
Read More
““Yes,” you say. “When you lost the baby.” You angle your chin slightly. Your chin is a question. Don’t you remember, your chin asks. I’ve never known you to hide behind a euphemism like lost the baby before. I didn’t think I had to explain to you the reasons it was not a baby. I press a finger to the cold metal of the dessert fork on my placemat. I flip the fork so it is upside down. I flip it again. Rightsideup. ”
Read MoreLeah Nelson and Sarah Leavitt shows us the labour of love, loss, and life in striking film Tangles at the Vancouver International Film Festival 2026.
In Experiments in a Failed Repair, an art exhibition that deconstructs and decolonises the monumentalisation of violence, Ghinwa Yassine challenges viewers to confront human violence through the rubble and remains of homes destroyed by war—and to imagine the lives that once existed within them.
Writer Brett Nelson reviews 'The Effect,' the latest production from The Cultch that explores the chemical nature of love and grapples with depression.
In this review of Frequencies: A Novel, Sophie Ganic’s debut, we explore a chilling blend of dystopian science fiction and feminist horror. Set in the aftermath of a deadly global outbreak, the novel examines isolation, psychological unraveling and past trauma.
Jill Goranson and Kelsi James presents Burn Blue, a multidisciplinary performance, at the 2026 Vancouver Fringe Festival, exploring water, memory, migration and colonisation, and the meaning of home through dance, music, poetry, and puppetry.
