White Shirt
In this debut poetry collection by former sports journalist Laurie MacFayden, best friends scream downhill on their ten-speed bikes; a tree planter spells out her lover’s name in seedlings; and a mysterious entity steps out of the mist in Stanley Park. The author contemplates how best to seduce Joan of Arc and goes on an abstract-expressionist date with Jackson Pollock. Like the white shirt in the title, these poems are crisp, seductive and a little bit sweaty.
Winner, 2011 Golden Crown Literary Society Awards;
Finalist, 2011 Lambda Literary Awards;
Longlisted, 2011 Alberta Readers Choice Awards
How to Order
White Shirt ($16) is part of Frontenac House’s Dektet 10th anniversary lineup. To order White Shirt, click here.
Reviews
“Laurie MacFayden’s White Shirt is the sort of garment that appeals and reveals far more than it conceals. Love, longing, loss and desire drip and swirl like the poet’s own Pollock-inspired cover art.”
— Alberta Views
“MacFayden’s poems are bright, colorful splashes of language … boisterous, roughhousing, tomboyish poems. But for all of their energy and muscle-flexing, they have a wonderful, carefully crafted artistry
that contains and balances their zesty play on words, zany metaphors
and sexual exuberance. … Poetry and humanity both need her lusty,
never-give-up, never-stay-down spirit wrapped in masterfully
executed poems.”— Rob Jacques, Amazon.com
“White Shirt announces itself with stunning cover art by MacFayden herself. The cover art, Allegra, its violent lashings and splatters of paint, testifies to MacFayden’s sensibility: Her work is ejaculations, vivid, colourful, clashing, all indelibly marking the white page. … Come to think of it, MacFayden’s cover painting also recalls the black, yellow, red explosion that is the cover for Irving Layton’s poetry book Fornalutx. She also seems to share his admirable frankness.”
— Halifax Chronicle Herald
“… at home in the canon of Canadian lyricism.”
— The Globe and Mail
“Laurie MacFayden is one of my favourite poets. Her poems vibrate with a sensorial precision that never fails to capture. From a wild date with Jackson Pollock, to poems of longing and desire, to clear-eyed rants on sexuality, she does what all great writers do – that is; she shines her incredible, unique light on what it is to be human. MacFayden pushes at the darkness with her poetry – she titillates, teases, intrigues and entertains – and I hope she keeps doing it for a very, very long time.”
— Thomas Trofimuk, author of Waiting for Columbus
“when i first heard laurie macfayden read in edmonton, it was obvious she was a cut above the pack of poets waiting for their turn to be heard. she’s a drag queen in a pink limousine, journalist of whyte ave & the two-lane world, an important lady in an important time.”
— c.r. avery, beatbox poet and spoken-word outlaw
“This is the ‘classic’ hard-drinking, hard-living, gravelly poet’s voice – only it comes from a woman. It’s a bust-out-of-the-closet voice where occasional touchstone rhymes and furious lists score the page. The poems are stripped down, poignant, exact, and as heartily playful as any serious blues. Here is Sappho crossed with the Supremes.”
— Jury, Dektet 2010