An exciting evolution of Imagist and Beat form, a desert flower song, that celebrates New Age poetics, Gone South by
Barry McKinnon and above/ground press. Barry McKinnon (poet, teacher) lives and works in British Columbia. He has studied at
Mount Royal College, took coursework with Irving Layton at Sir George Williams University, Montreal, earning a B.A. and then
studying at the University of British Columbia, earning an M.A. He is widely published and was awarded the Dorothy Livesay
Poetry Award (1991) and the bp Nichol Chapbook Award (1994). He teaches English in Prince George.
At the beginning of this Chapbook is an introduction that explains that “Gone South” is a Native American euphemism for dying coined
in the 1700’s. What follows is a broken introspection within the desert with nature images that flower and fall like the rain. A
travelogue of daymares, bars, “America”, children, dogs, girder bridges and steamboats, an 88 Buick, pools, canals, range music, Slab
City . . . the images woven with the natural world in a profound melee of “sang the broken heart.” A deep brooding riff in truncated
thought forms that almost borders on the nonsensical creating mystical blues and water in a desert landscape, often exploring the
nature of love in the post-modern world.
A fantastical transcendental Beat, the short thought forms strung together across the page play with the light and heat as if baking
in the desert sun. Like a Muse that lures in the hope of Nirvana, “Love in the Time of Cholera”, the boat that sails up and down
the river and never stops.
A beautiful study in original New Age poetics, Gone South by Barry McKinnon.
Available @ above/ground press.
