Oooo, Robyn Sarah likes me.....

Mail today brought a lovely note from Robyn Sarah. She is guest editing the mostly-poetry summer issue of the New Quarterly and has decided to take one of my poems for it. She says she has always been "one of those who believes in poems that are 'short, sharp -- a cry from the heart.'"

What a delight. First, to be in the New Quarterly, which is a favourite magazine that I never get to submit to, as I'm one of the editors. (Yes, I know I had that poem in Weddings and Other Disasters issue. It's a long story about that, the gist of which is it wasn't my idea.)

Second, better, to have this validation and kind attention from Robyn Sarah, a poet I admire, whose work stirs me. If you're not Canadian you may not know her; so little work crosses the border. Should I call her our Mary Oliver? Our Grace Schulman? She's neither, exactly -- but she is a poet worth reading and learning by heart. Someday I'd love to meet her.

Who said that, about the cry from the heart?