Cloud on My Tongue

David E. Kemp, a former drama professor at Queen’s University, is the
author of The Pleasures and Treasures of the United Kingdom.

Richard Olafson’s published collections of poetry include Blood on the
Moon, The Names of Being, In Arbutus Light, Apotheosis, and the
critically acclaimed The Ocean and My Body Are One. Cloud on My Tongue
deals with the metaphysical and the natural worlds, and with topics
ranging from love to poetry itself. The language is supple and resonant
in these poems, which covey the inner essence of the human and natural
experience. Olafson’s lyricism is especially evident in the nature
poem “The Swans in Beacon Hill Park” and the literary appreciation
“The Poems of Octavio Paz.”

A highlight of the collection is the haiku series “Roses, Pearls,
Oceans, Stars.” This Japanese lyric form of 17 syllables in lines of
5, 7, and 5 syllables, which flourished from the 17th to 19th centuries,
dealt traditionally with images of the natural world. There has been
much contemporary imitation in Western literature, but there have surely
been few more faithful emulators than Olafson.

This is poetry that bursts forth with the colorful melody of the 21st
century while at the same time retaining a vision that is firmly rooted
the tradition of a living literary past.