Hand to Hand

Sheila Martindale is poetry editor of Canadian Author and Bookman and
the author of No Greater Love.

Recurring themes run through this well-organized and densely packed
collection. The one that stands out is war—its brutality, its
futility, and the devastating effect it has on people. The title poem,
among others, makes for difficult reading. War’s attendant side
effects, including famine, are also explored in harrowing detail. The
poet experiences the danger of everyday life, too, whether it is a deep
creek that has tried to claim several lives (both human and animal),
thin ice, or mountainous hairpin-bend roads with precipitous drops.
There is a nightmarish quality to some of the poems, indicating that
these dangerous places are not merely physical. Slugs and other
disgusting creepy-crawlies are given some attention, and horses make
several appearances. Although there is some levity in the section where
the poet describes what she was doing during certain “Famous
Moments” (such as when Ben Johnson broke the world record for the
100-metre dash), don’t look for much in the way of humour in this
book—these are mostly deep studies about the dark side of life and
humankind.

McInnis has an ironic touch in a couple of poems wherein she describes
how two of her uncles were killed as they worked on the early
electricity lines, and how her father’s heart was kick-started by an
electric current in the hospital. It would seem from poems such as
“Bitches” and “What I Was Doing When Princess Diana Went into
Labour,” that McInnis has experienced living on a reserve. My
favourite lines in the book are from the poem “Ice Bridge,” in which
she notes that “the only ice I’d ever known [was] caught in tiny
gold claws / on the third finger of my left hand.” This collection
will not appeal to anyone wishing to be uplifted by poetry, but it will
interest those who are not afraid to venture into the uncharted
territory of the soul.