Swan Country

Emilie Sion was fascinated by the connection between the spirit and the real world and her poetry can perhaps be considered a shamanistic revelation of this connection showing us something we all know but may not be able to see clearly or articulate directly. The Italian French and above all the British Columbia landscapes that she encountered and the people with whom she shared her experiences inspired much of her poetry. Her poems have appeared in a whos who list of Canadian British and American literary journals including Prism International the Fiddlehead Northern Light The Far Point Souwester Canadian Poetry Quartet The Malahat Review The Canadian Forum The Antigonish Review Aphra and many others.Emilie is moonshine on the back garden and sun on the front. She writes from childhood to motherhood with the mind of both the wonder never lost of things ominous and mindboggling in their nuance and beauty.The only poet who truly compares with Emilie is Emily Dickinson. Then did Emily ever stand with the ocean turning pools deepening small fishes hitting her legs? There is the scope of far places of earth and mind in Emilie a sense of European surreal and American ordinary William Carlos Williams red wheelbarrow in the rain brilliance to her work.This is a bedside book a poem before bed to dream on and one to wake up to take out and look at the world through Emilies eyes.-- George McWhirter Vancouvers inaugural poet laureate