Author(s): Sylvia Legris

Poetry

"Nature converges with words" in Sylvia Legris's melopoeic new book of poems, The Principle of Rapid Peering. Borrowing a phrase from the nineteenth-century field biologist Joseph Grinnell that describes the feeding behavior of certain birds who live in a continuous mode of "rapid peering," Legris explores this rich theme of active observation through seasonal poems that form a kind of almanac or naturalist's notebook in poetry. On long walks through prairie habitats near her home in Saskatchewan, moths appear, as do birds and plants and larvae, all meticulously observed and documented with an oblique sense of the pandemic in the background. Elements of weather, ornithology, entomology, and anatomy feed Legris's condensed, inflective lines, making the heart infloresce and the intellect dance.