Mere Observations

John Walker is a professor of Spanish studies at Queen’s University.

Métis writer Derek Garson’s first book is a quirky compilation of
five collections of poems for young adults.

By Garson’s own definition, the mere observation of the title should
be understood thus: mere is a mispronunciation of the word “mirror”
and observation is the “objective reflection of one’s self when one
is soul-searching.” There is a great deal of this word-play and
mind-bending in Garson’s recommendation of how we should read his
poetry. For example, his so-called interactive poetry is a “dialogue
between the unity of thought and feeling when the consummation of the
two are expressed in all that is Word and Deed.” The author also plays
around with thesis/antithesis/synthesis concepts, culminating in the
notion that Mere Observations is the “sum total of existence brought
into a contextual one.”

If the reader can get past this kind of theoretical mumbo-jumbo and the
name-games of the one-page introduction, there are five collections with
odd titles like “Sir Esse Ens of Esprit de Corps,” “Sir Dreadlee
Grove Esq.,” “EupheMystic,” “Dovetale of Dei Versatile Ink,”
and “Straga-Gem’s Pearl of Wisdom,” which do in fact deal with
conventional poetic themes like love, music, loneliness, time and space,
truth, and death. Unfortunately, these and other themes get lost or
sidetracked by the self-indulgent theories about the poems/observations.


The reader will probably derive more pleasure from the collection by
dipping into the poems at random so as to avoid being hidebound or
hamstrung by the introductory explanations of the mere observations.
Recommended with reservations.