Creamsicle Stick Shivs

Ronald Charles Epstein is a Toronto-based freelance writer and published poet.

Nova Scotia poet and novelist John Stiles uses verse to chronicle his
life. His Annapolis Valley childhood inspired his first collection,
Scouts Are Cancelled. Further adventures in Halifax, Toronto, and Great
Britain are reflected in his latest book.

Although Insomniac Press refers to Toronto as “self-obsessed,” the
author avoids cheap shots as he observes the Greater Toronto Area with
unsentimental honesty. In “Page 67, Ripped,” he describes a troubled
student as “one of the lucky chickens that made it out of the battery
/ that is the Dufferin Peel school system.” Such denunciations of
conformity were more common in the 1960s than today; perhaps the poet
can be described as an “old soul.”

“Mr. Dinkmouth,” a description of a pathetic middle-aged man, also
highlights the poet’s true nature. He speculates that the title
character was “a sensitive child, I suppose, though I wouldn’t have
/ shown him no mercy.” Afterwards, he stated that Dinkmouth was
bullied at church camp by a sadist who put “ants in his nose.” This
raises questions about Stiles’s self-revelation. If he had been the
victim’s fellow camper, would he have acted equally atrociously?
Perhaps he might have been content to play the “regular kid” and
merely ostracize the “nerd.”

Stiles’s poetry is accessible, not “spoon-fed.” Creamsicle Stick
Shivs is recommended for returning high-school students as an ideal
rehabilitation exercise for atrophied critical faculties.