Kenneth Sherman s work has always displayed a vibrant lyricism, so it s no surprise that his powerful new collection, "Jogging with the Great Ray Charles," contains a number of poems with musical motifs. In pieces such as Clarinet, Transistor Sister, and the book s title poem, Sherman ponders our human transience while searching for a voice to stand time s test. But in addition to his intensely lyrical work, Sherman confronts health concerns in a language that is Shaker-plain. The book concludes with the sombre, compassionate, and truly remarkable seven-part Kingdom, a meditation on the plight of the dispossessed.
In a "Globe and Mail" review of Sherman s "The Well: New and Selected Poems," Fraser Sutherland noted, Kenneth Sherman always seems to be listening to the voice of Canadian soil and landscape at the same time as he is attentive to the great European metaphysical theme of the soul in conflict with the world and time. This provides a key to the range of the current book. There are poems rooted in Northern Ontario and those dealing with the European Holocaust. Sherman has also included three brilliant translations of Yiddish poets that appeared in the "Malahat Review" s "At Home in Translation" issue.
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