Robin Mathews (Vancouver: Northland Publications, 2004). Review by Ron Dart.
“I’m not saying Robin Mathews is nearly as good as he’s
going to be. But he’s so far ahead of the ruck, right now, that if he wanted to
look back at them, he’d have to use binoculars.”
—Milton Acorn (1976)
Think Freedom is
Robin Mathews 11th book of poetry, and, true to form, he hugs and
stays close to most of the major political themes of the time. Mathews is probably the best living Canadian
political poet, and Think Freedom proves,
yet once again, why this is the irrefutable case.
Think Freedom is a
fit companion piece to Mathews’s previous book of poetry, Being Canadian in Dirty Imperialist Times (2000), but Think Freedom was written in the
post-9-11 world, and, as such, many of the issues that emerged since then are
on front stage in this poetic missive and tract for the times.
Think Freedom is
divided into four inviting and challenging sections: 1) In a Glass, Darkly, 2)
Seeing and Being, 3) Blind Faith, The New World Order and 4) Think Freedom.
Each section, surgically so, cuts through much fat and silliness and attempts, after
such a poetic operation, to offer healing and hope in an ever darkening time.
Each poem demands of the reader a serious and substantive
rethinking of how we often see and interpret the world and how we could do so
in a different way. Mathews takes arrow from quiver and hits many a bull’s eye.
Both the Canadian and the American setting is faced and not flinched from.
Poetry as moral and prophetic vision is held high rather than poetry as a
padding about in the ambiguous maze of the inner life or poetry as a thin
affirmation of the status quo.
Most of the poems in Think
Freedom are explicitly political, but there are some touching love poems
that draw the reader back for many a reread. It is these poems that make for a
fine balance to the more demanding political poems. There are also a few fine probes into some important religious
themes and motifs. It is these poems
that deal with love and religion that pull the curtains back for a fuller view
and vision of things.
We have few good political poets in Canada, and Think Freedom ably demonstrates why Mathews is our best at the present time, and why, heeding
Acorn’s lead, binoculars would be needed by Mathews to see those close to him.
rsd