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Journal of Education and Development in the Caribbean

And Caret Bay Again: New and Selected Poems by Velma Pollard

Pages: 
177-179
Publication Date: 
March 2011
Keywords: 
Issue: 
Abstract: 

In "And Caret Bay Again", veteran Caribbean poet Velma Pollard treats us to an exciting mixture of the old and the new—many old favourites from previous collections (“Crown Point”, “Shame Trees Don't Grow Here”, “The Best Philosophers I Know Can't Read or Write”, “Leaving Traces”) and 18 new poems. (The volume is divided according to these different collections of works). This new collection (re-collection) is tied together by an exciting feature taken from the world of Art—the diptych—that is signalled in the title of the book. And Caret Bay Again is the reprising of poems in parts, suites or series. “At Cienfuegos I” is hinged to “At Cienfuegos II”; “Thinking Re-thinking the Baths” contains within itself the diptych; “Conversations (Again?)” suggests a previous Conversation; “Hindsight II” implies “Hindsight”. The diptych is extended further in exciting triptychs—“Road to Harriman Upstate NY” is part of a triptych including “Harriman Revisited I&II”, as is “Caret Bay I&II” and “Caret Bay (Again)”. The poet is not unaware of the “duets and trios” (“Our Mother”). “Trento I-IV” and “While TV Towers Burn: I-IV” push the triptych one panel further and delivers closure, and signals completion.

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