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Poetry in Motion: Renée M. Sgroi + In a Tension of Leaves and Binding
Renée M. Sgroi’s newest collection In a Tension of Leaves and Binding (Guernica Editions) is a poetic journey that delves into our relationship to the natural world told from both human and animal viewpoints. The collection challenges traditional ideas of poetry by incorporating conceptual and visual elements that disrupt our typical understandings of language and meaning.
Below, Renée shares a little about her poetic style and shares a reading from her book.
I spent many years studying piano – a fact that I think is quite apparent in my poetic style, as my poems have such a preoccupation with sound and rhythm. I’ve heard people point to the influence of Gertrude Stein in my work, and while I’m definitely a fan, I think my style is less Stein and more aural, as I often hear the words before I really think about them. So yes, my poetic style is definitely musical and this book certainly includes lyric poems, but I also wanted to engage in more experimental forms – partly as a way to address the threads of grief and death that run through the work, and partly as a way to explore the imagined voices created here. Or perhaps I’m simply preoccupied with grief, and death, and also breath.
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Renée M. Sgroi holds a PhD in Education from the University of Toronto, an M.Sc. in Creativity and Change Leadership from SUNY Buffalo State, and works as a post-secondary educator. A runner up in the UK’s 2020 erbacce poetry prize, her debut poetry collection, life print, in points, was published that year by erbacce-press. Renée’s poetry has been published in numerous journals and anthologies including Pinhole Poetry, The /temz/ Review, The Windsor Review, The Beliveau Review, Lummox (U.S.), Prairie Fire, The Prairie Journal, Fresh Voices, and many others. Renée is a contributing editor to Arc Poetry.
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In a Tension of Leaves and Bindings is available now, here or from your favourite indie bookstore.
