National Poetry Month : Renée Sarojini Saklikar,

INVESTIGATOR: as found by,

 April 19 in the year―

we walked―knees bloody

hair tossed―coats thrown

down to the bare stone ground―

no chance of ever going back,

none at all:  ≈≈ / ⌂⌂.

our scribes wrote: ≈≈ / ⌂⌂.

≈≈ / ⌂⌂, be it resolved ≈≈ / ⌂⌂.

We did not ask for mercy

that Grand Hall, we heard them:

≈≈ / ⌂⌂. Their sayings,

night after night, and―above:

Cold-Heart-Wolf Moon,

laughing ≈≈ / ⌂⌂.

calling: us, our damned visions,

close, closer: ≈≈ / ⌂⌂.

See you inside, we sang out as――

Renée Sarojini Saklikar recently completed her term as the first Poet Laureate for the City of Surrey, British Columbia.

Her latest book is a B.C. bestseller: Listening to the Bees (Nightwood Editions, 2018).

Renée’s first book, children of air india, (Nightwood Editions, 2013) won the 2014 Canadian Authors Association Award for poetry. Her second book, co-edited with Wayde Compton, The Revolving City: 51 Poems and the Stories Behind Them (Anvil Press/SFU Public Square, 2015) was a City of Vancouver book award finalist.

Renée’s chapbook, After the Battle of Kingsway, the bees, (above/ground press, 2016), was a finalist for the 2017 bpNichol award.

Her poetry has been made into musical and visual installations, including the opera, air india [redacted]. 

Renée was called to the BC Bar as a Barrister and Solicitor, served as a director for youth employment programs in the BC public service, and now teaches for Simon Fraser University and Vancouver Community College.

She curates the popular poetry reading series, Lunch Poems at SFU, and serves on the boards of Event magazine and The Capilano Review and is a director for the board of the Surrey International Writers Conference.