The Prodigal Sun

Donalee Moulton-Barrett was a writer and editor in Halifax.

Boschka Layton’s poetry has all the force of a nuclear explosion. It’s dynamic. Sometimes her bluntness doesn’t work; most of the time it does.

Layton’s poetry is like a well-crafted Chinese fabric. The weave is tight, the pattern sharp and distinctive: there are no loose ends. She can take the obvious, the trivial, even the cliched and refresh it. In “Donald Who Died In Bed,” for example, Layton talks about death, about watching a loved one’s body rot. You know they’re dying but you’re never ready when the time finally comes: “We whispered at your side /all night / your eyes were down: told jokes /at the punch /line your mouth puckered /held, returned to go.”

In addition to her poems, Layton has included many of her illustrations and four short stories. There is nothing special about the line drawings, dispensed like a dollop of medicine throughout The Prodigal Sun. Some manage to tickle the imagination but most are ordinary and somewhat boring. Her short stories fare better. They don’t have the power of her poetry, primarily because they are too brief. There’s no time to build momentum before the climax; and yet the work is captivating, aggressive, and highly readable — like all the writing in The Prodigal Sun.