POET, EDITOR, GUIDE


I'm a poet based in rural Ontario with roots in Atlantic and western Canada, and Montreal.

My books are Yellow Crane (2018; finalist for the ASLE Book Award and a Jury Selection for the Grand prix du livre de Montreal) and The Rapids (2012; finalist for the A.M. Klein Prize), both from Brick Books. Volta (2002; winner of the A.M. Klein Prize) and Swimming Among the Ruins (2000; finalist for the ReLit and Pat Lowther Awards) were published by Signature Editions.

Chapbooks from Gaspereau Press are Obelisk (2017) and Twenty Views of the Lachine Rapids (2012). The Sky These Days, a letterpress chapbook, was hand-made in 2016 by Hugh Barclay at Thee Hellbox Press.

I'm also a member of the collaborative group Yoko's Dogs, four poets writing and publishing together since 2006. Our books are Whisk (2012; Pedlar Press) and the chapbook Rhinoceros (2017; Gaspereau Press).
 
Visit Concrete & River for a glimpse into the lives and work of poets I'm reading. For a dip into micro-poetry, stop by HALIBUT, the online journal I curate with poet Mary di Michele.

Collaboration and workshopping  are some of the many pleasures of the writing and reading life. Are you interested in deepening your engagement with poetry? Ready to welcome a second set of eyes on something you're writing? Looking for mentorship as you develop a project, or perhaps in a more sporadic way? I'm happy to accompany you as field guide with any of these; find out how here. 

I'm also available for classroom and book club visits, round table discussions, readings.

Some of the workshops and studios I've led:  

  • Where the Joy Is: creative engagement through poetry
  • Domestic Wild: Meeting Poetry Where It Lives: how poetry can awake and connect us with the wild in the everyday
  • Exciting the Toad: the imaginative power of language that excites idea and experience into poetry
  • Poetry & the Tiny Sea in the Ear: attending to what's in and around us, teasing the unusual out of the everyday, surprising expectation and sharpening expression
  • One Voice = Many Voices: a workshop in collaboration
  • Concrete & River: fostering energy in poems we write; following currents of poems we read
For more information on me and my work, please email <susan[at]susangillis[dot]ca> or connect via the form in the sidebar.