Cordless

Beyond the uncertainty of the world's inhumanity, lies the fragile possibility of wisdom and perhaps even faith. With a complexity of resonant personal and historical memories, Thomas Verny's keen intellect challenges those who doubt the power of poetry to connect us to each other. Geoff Hancock, editor-in-chief, Canadian Fiction MagazineThomas Verny's Cordless is the work of a jester. This powerhouse of masks produces an effect that we have not read in many years. There is no learned rhetoric to dazzle the sleeping mind. There is none of that strange madness some of us share of investigating dimensions that lie beyond our stations. Black stays black in this poet's words. In the hands of a less sly writer the jabs and jeering would grate the ears of many rulers and serfs. His call for conscienceness comes from a fearless thirst for not so much remembrance as much as the awareness that the torments of evil have been constant and are sadly unending. Antonio D'AlfonsoPoetry is at once an act of compression and compassion. Thomas Verny's subtle inquiries into the challenges of being human are bright with insight won the hard way: by living a life and reflecting, as unflinchingly as one can, on the life we live and the death we owe the universe. Verny's work wins the highest compliment: witty, well designed and articulately presented, his poems bear reading . . . and re-reading. Brendan Howley, screenwriter, investigative journalist, novelistThomas Raphael Verny 's poems are unique in the way he colours his own earthly lyricism with sardonic wit and telling imagery. He has developed a mastery of both the very short verses and longer narrative poems that document individual lives and social milieus. I found myself deeply moved listening to Thomas at public readings, his voice both intimate and intense, sweet and menacing. His poems are full of surprises.Mick Burrs won the 1998 Saskatchewan Book Award for Poetry for Variations on the Birth of Jacob. He is a former editor of Grain magazine and author of 8 books of poetry.