Turning Dirt into Jewels

David Anonby is a sessional instructor in the English Department of
Trinity Western University, Langley, B.C.

Jean Greenberg’s first collection experiments with free verse on a
wide array of topics of human interest, but always with a blend of
humour and pathos. The pieces range from short, carefree studies with
staccato lines to more psychologically involved stream-of-consciousness
poems. She manages to navigate controversial issues of politics, gender,
race, and religion without raising eyebrows or giving offence.

Greenberg diffuses potential political tension in “Dale Chihuly,” a
poem about the Israeli–Palestinian impasse: “a wall of ice / might
melt middle-east tensions.” She employs her wit more bitingly in
“Vern Crow,” a eulogy for a homeless man who died of exposure on the
streets of Toronto: “The CBC feeds Vern a microphone / wants to know
what Vern thinks / about our overcrowded shelters.” “White Gloves”
involves a fascinating juxtaposition with redemptive overtones. A petite
warden in a modern prison is called all manner of expletives by the
inmates; the narrator, in turn, recalls her grandmother who performed
weekly piano recitals for prisoners in 1910, convinced that “her
Presbyterian God would / protect her / if she wore her white gloves /
…everyone called her ma’am.”

“If Only” portrays a 15-year-old girl’s struggle to find her
poetic voice and her dissatisfaction with canonical poetry by authors
such as Percy Shelley and Robert Browning. The narrator, who is the
artist as an adult, muses that William Carlos Williams would have been a
more strategic mentor. Greenberg’s predilections also appear to be her
influences, for her craftsmanship and sensibilities are typically
modernist. “It’s Nothing, Just a Little Blood” is a tour de force
of pluralism and multiculturalism. Mount Carmel Chinese Catholic Church,
“lined with red pagodas,” hosts a tai chi class under the display of
“a blond blue-eyed Jesus.” By substituting the Semitic Christ of
history with the Caucasian Christ of folklore, Greenberg raises subtle
questions about the tension between cultural distinctiveness and
conformity in a cosmopolitan city like Toronto.