The Outerwards [Paperback]

“I was awake. / The hour was wrong,” de Meijer writes, and her poems track, in visceral and tender detail, the distraction, exhaustion, exhilaration, and fear of child-rearing through crisis. For de Meijer, the experience was also a crisis of language, and the struggle to find new terms for her state. Addressed, in part, to a child she calls “my grievous spectacle, / my dearest unpossessable,”The Outer Wardsis everywhere marked by a joy in words—their quick-fire turns, sumptuous sounds, and nursery-rhyme seductions.

“Sadiqa’s poetry is taut, spare, incredibly evocative…and unerringly sharp.” –Wayne Grady “A voice of authority and grace.” –Michael Crummey “[De Meijer’s] attention to detail creates dynamic pieces.” –Canadian Literature

Sadiqa de Meijer’sdebut collection,Leaving Howe Island, was a nominee for the 2014 Governor General’s Award for English-language poetry and for the 2014 Pat Lowther Award. She lives with her family in Kingston, Ontario.