Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm - (Re)Generation: The Poetry of Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm

Cover page of the book titled "Re(Generation) The Poetry of Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm selected with an introduction by Dallas Hunt" shows a geometrical pattern on the bottom left and a spiral on the right. (Re)GenerationThe Poetry of Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm Selected with an introduction by Dallas Hunt and an afterword by Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm Wilfrid Laurier University Press acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts for our publishing program. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund for our publishing activities. Funding provided by the Government of Ontario and the Ontario Arts Council. This work was supported by the Research Support Fund.

---

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Title: (Re)generation : the poetry of Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm / selected with an introduction by Dallas Hunt and an afterword by the author.

Other titles: Poems. Selections Names: Akiwenzie-Damm, Kateri, 1965 author. | Hunt, Dallas, editor, writer of introduction. Series: Laurier poetry series. Description: Series statement: Laurier poetry series | Includes bibliographical references. Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210133708 | Canadiana (ebook) 20210133716 | ISBN 9781771124713 (softcover) | ISBN 9781771124720 (EPUB) | ISBN 9781771124737 (PDF) Classification: LCC PS8601.K49 A6 2021 | DDC C811/.6dc23

---

Front cover image by Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm.

Cover design by Gary Blakeley. Interior design by Mike Bechthold. 2021 Wilfrid Laurier University Press Waterloo, Ontario, Canada www.wlupress.wlu.ca This book is printed on FSC certified paper. It contains recycled materials and other controlled sources, is processed chlorine free, and is manufactured using biogas energy. Every reasonable effort has been made to acquire permission for copyright material used in this text, and to acknowledge all such indebtedness accurately. Any errors and omissions called to the publishers attention will be corrected in future printings.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the publisher or a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). For an Access Copyright licence, visit http://www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free to 1-800-893-5777.

, Tanis MacDonald I am happy to serve as the general editor for the Laurier Poetry Series, the development and growth of which I have followed from its early days. My gratitude goes to Neil Besner and Brian Henderson, who conceived of the Laurier Poetry Series in 2002 as a way to offer a more robust selection of a single poets work than could be found in an anthology. In 2004, the Laurier Poetry Series launched the first volume, Catherine Hunters selection of the poems of Lorna Crozier, Before the First Word. Neil served as General Editor for all volumes until he was joined in 2016 by Brian, when he left his role as WLU Presss Director.

In an act of commitment to poetry publication that is nothing short of inspiring, the Laurier Poetry Series expanded to a list of thirty-three fascinating titles under their leadership. The retirement of the original editors has given me a surprising historical jolt. But thinking historically is a good way to revisit the original plans for the series, and to think towards the future. Under my editorial eye, the series will retain its original aim to produce volumes of poetry made widely available to new readers, including undergraduate students at universities or colleges, and to a general readership who wish for more poetry in their poetry. WLU Press also retains its commitment to produce beautiful volumes and to alert readers to poems that remain vital to thinking about urgencies of the contemporary moment. It is a reality that poetry books are produced in smaller print runs and often on a shoestring, and as a consequence, original collections of poetry tend to go out of print too quickly and far too precipitously.

The series has the added goal of bringing poems from out-of-print collections back into the public eye and the public discourse. The Presss commitment to the work of literary studies includes choosing editors for each volume who can reflect deeply on the body of work, as well as inviting original afterwords from the poets themselves. As we embark on this next turn of the series, access is our watchword. Canadian literature has undeniably had a checkered history of exclusionary practices, so who gets the nod and who takes part in discussionsas readers and as writersof Canadian poetry? In the classroom, it is my privilege and my task to introduce a generation of students to the practice of reading poetry as a vital thread in cultural, social, and political conversations, conversations that challenge ideas about Canada and seek to illuminate and bring to consciousness better futures. For that work, I want access to as many voices on the page, and as robust a selection of poems from those voices, as I can get my hands on. This is the language of the bibliophile, the craver of books, the person whose pedagogical pleasure comes from putting poetry books into the hands of others and saying, simply, Read this, and well talk.

Multi-author anthologies do not always usefully demonstrate to readers how a poets work shifts and changes over the years, nor do they always display the ways that a single poets poems speak to and with and sometimes usefully against one another. I want at my elbow, in every discussion, inside and outside the classroom, our best poetic practitioners. I want books that offer not just a few poems, but dozens: selected volumes not only by the splashiest prize winners but also significantly by poets who have been carrying a full cultural backpack for decades. I also want to showcase new and prolific voices who have taken off like rockets. For this, I am grateful for the chance to bring these poets to you, or bring them back to you. Turn is sometimes a return and sometimes a revolution.

Neil and Brian started this series off with a bang, and now its time to light another fuse. The volume you hold in your hands sizzles. Read this, and well talk. Tanis MacDonald General Editor

Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm is a member of the Saugeen Ojibway Nation, Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation, on the Saugeen Peninsula in Ontario. Kateri is a poet, writer, spoken word artist, Indigenous arts advocate, publisher, and educator. She is an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto Scarborough, teaching creative writing, Indigenous literatures, and oral traditions in the English Department.

Previously, she has taught creative writing and Indigenous literatures at the University of Manitoba, the Banff Centres Aboriginal Arts Program, and the Enowkin International School of Writing in partnership with the University of Victoria. Her publications encompass fiction, non-fiction, radio plays, television and film, libretti, a graphic novel, spoken word CDs, and two collections of poetry. Her teaching and creative work is firmly decolonial, a practice of cultural resurgence, affirmation and survivance. Kateri is a nominee for the 2021 Ontario Arts Council Indigenous Arts Award and a recipient of a 2016 Hnatyshyn Foundation REVEAL Indigenous Arts Award for writing. Her 2015 book of short stories,