NEW HOPE INTERNATIONAL REVIEW

An independent small press poetry review

NHI independent review
The Fiddlehead
UNB
PO Box 4400
Fredericton
NB
E3B 5A3
Canada
ISSN 015-0630
$15
Subscriptions: 4 issues $30 [RoW US$36]
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Latest issue appears to be #236.
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This page last updated: 13th October 2008. 		The Fiddlehead #228

The Fiddlehead is a substantial journal, published four times a year. This issue marks the fifth summer of Fiddlehead. The journal is divided into five poetry sections. There is also a very interesting essay by Tim Lilburn and a review section. Each contributor selected gives more than one poem and there is quite a wide range of topics and styles:

	Under the glass ceiling at Harvard Square station,
	a clear block of sky above us, we wait
	on a cement raft that floats between two rails —
	me, a milling crowd of students, and one brown swallow.
This is the opening to WAITING FOR THE T, by S E Venart, a very succinctly handled poem about death. The outcome for the swallow is predictable — a risky approach for a poet — and the poem is rich enough to sustain integrity throughout. Some of the other poems in the journal are not quite as successful as this, but the overall standard is high and this is a very worthy publication.

Shane Rhodes tackles the outdoors in SANCTUARY:

	Then we saw them, trees black matted,
	red and orange windchurn

	of papillating wingbeats
	each time the sun broke.

	Roiling quick boil
	beneath a surface calm.

	The bodies of butterflies (red
	and gold) crushed beneath our feet
and David Manicom, in BLACK BOUGH, ALMOST SPRING, gives homage to Pound's IN A STATION OF THE METRO:
	My young face against your wet, black hair.
	On the street, snow turns to rain.
	Burning wheel in a breathing arc,
	The steps unfold from singular dark
	And I am rising to you again.
This is a good journal for students to read and study.

reviewer: Doreen King.