Field Notes for the Self
Published by University of Regina Press
by Randy Lundy
Review by gillian harding-russell
$19.95 ISBN 978089776913
In Field Notes for the Self, Randy Lundy – a Barren Lands Cree originally from northern Manitoba but currently residing in Saskatchewan – writes meditations that embrace the landscape, memory and the ever-changing self. Most often in prose-poem style, the long, sinuous verses carry though along a difficult passage where bright and often homely or humorous images catch the light of truth and recognition in the reader’s mind. As the speaker lives with his dogs on an acreage in Pense SK, a rhythm to the seasons and a feeling of expectation (or its counterpart, disillusion) carry the poems towards discovery in the presence of nature. These meditations reflect not only what it is to be First Nation with a heightened burden of memory but also emphasize how difficult it is simply to be human.
Another feature of Lundy’s poetry is his panache for homely metaphor and humour. Lundy’s portrayal of this particular angst, however, extends beyond sociology and history to something even more deep-rooted, to what it may be to be human.
Field Notes for the Self is an immensely engaging and delightful read while the images speak so boldly between unravellings of thought, and we are persuaded to look inwards at what it is to be human, from Lundy’s experience as a First Nation man whose people have suffered wrongs and who has, himself, also made mistakes.
