[b:Strike/Slip|1292976|Strike/Slip|Don Mckay|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320506143s/1292976.jpg|1282073] by Don McKay, of Newfoundland, combines living creatures, geology and industry into lovely poems that somehow make the ugly beautiful and bring the natural world--whether pristine or deeply damaged--to life. I loved it, and can tell already that this is a book and a poet I will come back to many times. It won the 2007 Griffin Prize in Canada, and deservedly so, though truth be told I haven't yet read a Griffin winner I haven't loved.

Eventually water,
having been possessed by every verb--
been rush been drip been
geyser eddy fountain rapid drunk
evaporated frozen pissed
transpired--will fall
into itself and sit.

...Suppose Narcissus
were to find a nice brown pond
to gaze in: would the course of self-love
run so smooth with that exquisite face
rendered in bruin undertone,
shaken, and floated in the murk
between the deep sky and the ooze?
(from Pond)

As a lover of ponds and all the life that supports itself in the murk and the ooze, I can't tell you how much I loved those lines. It's true, ponds are humbling. Beautiful, but resolutely not majestic.

Lovers (and likers) of nature poetry will find much to love and reread in this collection. ( )

Nature lovers and geology geeks will love this collection of poems. ( )