Singing Home the Bones

by Scofield, Gregory

• ISBN13: 9781551927879
• ISBN10: 155192787X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-09-14
• Publisher: Raincoast Books, Polestar

Summary

In Singing Home the Bones, Gregory Scofield honors and reclaims the history of his native Métis family while exploring newly revealed secrets about his long-lost father's Jewish heritage. Through a series of powerful and ambitious "conversations" (with "the Dead," "the Missing," and the "Living"), Scofield brings his ancestors to life, intimately connecting their lives with his own story. Infused with the Cree language, deeply reverent, often funny, Singing Home the Bones speaks in the fresh yet familiar voice of one of Canada's leading poets.

Author Biography

Gregory Scofield has been Writer in Residence at Memorial University and currently teaches at the Alberta College of Art and Design.

Table of Contents

Conversations with the Dead
Women Who Forgot the Taste of Limes	10	(2)
Conversation My Chapan Mary Might Have Had with Mrs. Sarah F. Wakefield	12	(5)
The Repatriation of Mrs. Ida M. Scofield	17	(5)
Ida, but Still	22	(3)
The Will	25	(3)
Prayer Song for the Returning of Names and Sons	28	(6)
Conversation with Irene	34	(2)
Why I Want a Little Dog	36	(2)
Conversation My Mother Would Have Had with Me	38	(4)
Conversations with the Missing
If	42	(4)
Five Theories about My Father	46	(3)
The Unorthodox Funeral of Ron Miller	49	(3)
Conversation with My Stepfather	52	(3)
Conversation with the Poet	55	(7)
No Peace	62	(2)
The Unread Letter	64	(2)
Strange Request	66	(2)
I Don't Know My Body without You	68	(4)
Conversations with the Living
Prayer for the House	72	(2)
My Lover's Mother Laments Her Dancing Shoes	74	(2)
My Life Summed Up in Three Photographs (Thus Far)	76	(4)
Waiting for Your Phone Call	80	(2)
The Return	82	(2)
To Answer Some Things (For My Nicimos)	84	(2)
I Give You, Black Bear Woman	86	(4)
Invocation for the Bones in My Back	90	(4)
The Dancer
The Dancer (Club Mix)	94	(8)
Notes on the Poems	102	(9)
A-Haw, Kinanaskomitin	111	(1)
About the Author	112