Savouring the taste of life

A Curious Beatitude Sarah Klassen. The Muses’ Company Series by J. Gordon Shillingford Publishing, 2006.

National award-winning poet Sarah Klassen skillfully infuses her latest collection of poetry with philosophy, painting, music, and place, to create the taste of life. A Curious Beatitude explores the “curious” dialectic of blessing: joy and sorrow. Within the book’s four sections, the reader gazes at canvasses, listens to symphonies or a father’s violin, enters gardens, travels from Macchu Piccu to Lithuania, Crimea, Saskatchewan and the border of the “far country” beyond. Life is a journey, and there is the resonance of a common landscape, whether mountain, seaside, or prairie, along the way. But like Klassen, “Wouldn’t we all just love to know/ . . . the twists,/ the hairpin turns of the road,/ time that must elapse before arrival./ Places of rest along the way./ The destination.”

At less than 100 pages, this slim volume belies the fullness of its content. On the cover, a child in motion captures a fleeting moment of bliss; on every page Klassen probes the age-old issues of temporality – from childhood to the “improbable predictability” of death, from past to present, from the impermanence of the created to enduring heritage. I found myself “curiously undone” and somehow “comforted,” returning to the pages again and again.

A quality of spirituality permeates Klassen’s literary work; her dense and satisfying poetry, and refreshing artistry, bring to mind the symbolism of bread and water. I invite you to partake of A Curious Beatitude. Once you’ve savoured its richness, you’ll want to share it with others.

Connie Braun’s writing appears in the upcoming Half in the Sun: Anthology of Mennonite Writing (Ronsdale Press). She attends Northview MB Church, Abbotsford, B.C.