First Light, Last Light

First Light, Last Light
by Glen Sorestad
Published by Shadowpaw Press
Review by Brandon Fick
$19.99 ISBN 9781998273461

First Light, Last Light is a fitting title for a poetry collection that concerns itself with the beginning and end of human life, lost and recovered memories, the rhythmic cycle of the seasons, and glimpses of natural life in the early dawn of spring or the cold, shadowy dusk of winter. Glen Sorestad, one of Saskatchewan’s elder literary statesman, its first Poet Laureate, and co-founder of Thistledown Press, has compiled a book without pretension. Many of Sorestad’s poems are written from personal experience, meditating on his parents, brother, or children, a bulldozed childhood farm and disappeared dog, or more recently, medical appointments and the strange rituals of the pandemic. He also proves to be a keen observer of birds. All of this adds up to a satisfying portrait of a man.

In “Part One: The Human Touch,” Sorestad fluctuates between poeticizing contemporary life and excavating the past, with an emphasis on the latter. In fact, there is a poem titled “Excavation: Mount Pleasant Public School,” provoked by a photo, as a number are in this section. This 1940s school in Vancouver “long gone to wrecking ball / and the relentless bulldozers,” only survives in an image that will also be discarded soon “if not by me, then by those / who survive me, who may reflect / for a moment, before relegating / the past to the shredder.” Sorestad’s voice can be wistful, but never maudlin or anguished. In a poem addressing his grandsons, the sons of his deceased son, he says “it is quite all right if you are unable to think about / your Dad, whenever you are alone, without tears.” In “Three Graves,” reflecting on a field of his uncle’s that may have contained three Indigenous graves, Sorestad’s closing lines refuse to forget: “My uncle is dead, but those graves live / in my memory. I keep them for us all.” Notable poems in this section include the semi-humourous “What My Stylist Sees,” “Night Out,” and “Annual Medical,” plus the harrowing found poem, “Mariupol: March 2022,” but my favourites are those about his father, like “A Straightener of Nails.” That habit becomes the jumping off point for a poem that tries to fathom the psyche of an unsatisfied salesman, happier “with his hammer and his tobacco can, working / against time to set things true, the only way he could.”

As poignant and humane as the poems in the first half are, I believe Sorestad’s greatest passion – and some of his strongest writing – is found in “Part Two: Sunbeams and Shadows.” These are poems about the changing seasons, observing birds and other small creatures. It becomes evident that Sorestad is at least an amateur birder, unable to keep the owls, waxwings, catbirds, red-winged blackbirds, robins, juncos, chickadees, geese, blue jays, and yes, even crows, those “feathered bullies,” out of his verse. He points this out in “El Tecolote,” a poem which draws its title from the Spanish name for a Mexican owl: “I seldom go very long without / writing a poem through which birds flutter, / fly or soar, perch on roofs, or hoot / insistently from their leafy boughs.” The first line of “Snowy Owl Snarls Traffic in Saskatoon,” “Where did you come from, splendid winged one?” conveys his pure delight at avian interruptions, “respite from the usual urban ennui.” Aware of the fleeting nature of human life, Sorestad actually takes comfort from the fact that his frenemy crows will return to his back deck “every year, even after we have / left this place, and strangers will have / replaced us.” Spread across this section are apt yet non-showy descriptions of nature: snow geese are “ragged flying necklaces / strewn across / a robin’s egg sky,” a crow drinking from a fountain is an “ebony pumpjack,” a bitter winter wind “a blade / that cleaves to the bone.”

Reading First Light, Last Light is a breath of fresh air. This is accessible poetry, each and every poem understandable, and while that may not be for everyone, there is something to be said for writing that is direct, especially when a fair amount of contemporary poetry eludes resonance with a wider audience. And being direct does not preclude depth. I could hand this collection to anyone, and they could flip to any page for resonance. I suspect this is all part of Glen Sorestad’s poetic vision, which he has been sharing for over fifty years. Like melodious birdsong, First Light, Last Light sings clearly and unabashedly.

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