Always Die Before Your Mother: Poems

90 Pages·2009·0.36 MB·English

by  Patrick Woodcock

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LIKE AN EMBEDDED JOURNALIST, Patrick Woodcock
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Y writes from the front lines of experience. Cities reeling
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politics of the Arabian Peninsula, the darkest corners of
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theSouthAmericanrainforest—hispoemsbearwitness a e
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A toaworldthatisequallyimmediateandremote...and ic pi
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N far more complex than we often imagine. In Always Die W s
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G Before Your Mother Woodcock is like a photographer; o =
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M using the changeable lenses of image and idiom he d g
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¥ reveals detail and contrast in the all-too commonplace, ock 8
transforming them into explorations of human failures 8
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bothpublicandprivate—thoseofoursocieties,ourpolitics
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PATRICK WOODCOCKistheauthorofsixbooksof ie
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poetry. He was the poetry editor for the Literary Review
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ofCanadaandhashadnumerouspoemspublishedover o
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the last year in countries such as Canada, the U.S.,
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England, India, and Colombia. Because travel is so o Always Die Before Your Mother b
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essential to his writing, he has lived everywhere from
M Patrick Woodcock 7
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Iceland to Russia, Bosnia and Herzegovina to Oman, o Z
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Saudi Arabia, and Colombia. He currently lives in Erbil, h
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Iraq.Mostofthepoemsinthisbookwerereadatthe18th r :
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InternationalPoetryFestivalofMedellininJuly2008. c
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ISBN-13:978-1-55022-862-5 $16.95
51695 5
.
ECWPress E 5
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poems
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Coverdesign:BillDouglasatTheBang 9 781550 228625 p
trim:5.5x8.5 inches; spine: 0.296 inches
A l w a y s D i e B e f o r e
Yo u r M o t h e r

A l w a y s D i e B e f o r e
Yo u r M o t h e r
P a t r i c k Wo o d c o c k
ECWPress
Copyright©PatrickWoodcock,2009
Publishedbyecwpress,2120QueenStreetEast,Suite200,
Toronto,Ontario,Canadam4e1e2
416.694.3348/[email protected]
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced,storedinaretrievalsystem,
ortransmittedinanyformbyanyprocess—electronic,mechanical,photocopying,recording,or
otherwise—withoutthepriorwrittenpermissionofthecopyrightownersandecwpress.
libraryandarchivescanadacataloguinginpublication
Woodcock,Patrick,1968–
Poems.
“AmisFitbook”.
isbn-13:978-1-55022-862-5
isbn-10:1-55022-862-5
i.Title.
ps8595.o6397a792009 c811'.54 c2008-907561-7
Editorforthepress:MichaelHolmes/amisFitbook
Type:RachelIronstone
Printer:CoachHousePrinting
ThepublicationofAlwaysDieBeforeYourMotherhasbeengenerously
supportedbytheCanadaCouncilfortheArts,whichlastyearinvested$20.1
millioninwritingandpublishingthroughoutCanada,bytheOntarioArtsCouncil,by
theGovernmentofOntariothroughOntarioBookPublishingTaxCredit,bytheOMDC
BookFund,aninitiativeoftheOntarioMediaDevelopmentCorporation,
andbytheGovernmentofCanadathroughtheBookPublishing
IndustryDevelopmentProgram(bpidp).
printedandboundincanada
Contents
13 Executions
11 The Saddest Ink
12 Admiral Adrift
15 Aja’s Education Reform
16 The Peasants of Brazo’s Bend
17 Editing Howard Aster
18 Flood in Nizwa
19 Did I Sleep in the Jewish Cemetery Last Night?
20 Keith and the Kirkjug
23 Kimici’s
24 Mikica
25 Cracked Cups
26 Solidarity’s Shoes
27 The Final Stand
Dead Horses
31 Her Eyes Were Like Unwashed Hospital
Windows
32 The Burzhuika
33 The Bridge
34 After Watching a Gypsy Girl Crying in a
Cemetery
36 A Drunk Old Man Wanted an Audience and
Found Me
37 Grandmother’s Corpse
38 Stare at Horses
41 Thinking of St. Jude’s From Far Away
42 The Great Transgressors at the Falaj Daris Hotel
Shotguns and Accordions
45 Suicide Dogs
49 The Chiva Accident
50 New Rivers, Old Clothes
52 The Toilet Song
53 It’s the Little Things
54 No One Dies Gracefully
57 Bricks
59 Paul Durcan Wants a Taxi in the Chaparral
60 Los Magnificos
61 The Tumour
62 Jungle Slaughter
65 Thud
66 Grandmother’s Dance
67 Eyes
68 Gull
70 Dreaming of Canada with the Colombian
Pin Boys
71 Shotguns and Accordions
72 Tied
75 Dogs Fashioned Out of Rust
77 Small Helicopters: Cockfight at Mirolindo
78 Swimming With Pink Dolphins and
My Dead Mother
80 Isla de los Micos
83 Acknowledgements
84 Endnotes and Locations

13 Executions