Dream Catcher review – designed to linger in your mind
Dream Catcher issue 23
Resembling an anthology rather than a literary magazine, each issue of Dream Catcher offers up a collection of poetry, short stories, art and reviews that seemed designed to linger in your mind.
Issue 23 had a special focus on Canadian writers, so may not have been representative of the whole, but the quality and tone of the published works gave a clear impression of the tastes of editor Paul Sutherland.
I found that certain phrases and images rang out particularly in the poems, as in the curiously named V by Kate Marshal Flaherty, which ended on the fabulous line: “listening/in the silence of air/for the honk/ and sweep of angels”, leaving us with an impression of heavenly geese.
The feeling of displacement, of guilt over others’ displacement and nostalgic for an earlier, perhaps purer time were evident in many of the tales, to the extent that reading the carnival of Steven Bock’s Bonsai Garden was a relief, with its rampaging storyline and intriguing preoccupation with jackets.
Likewise, John Donlan’s series of nature-inspired poems was a retreat into a wilderness where the earthiness of botany nestles comfortably with hints of magic, as “Nebulas of algae breathe for us”, and a “A mink frog yips and skitters over the water.” I felt transported by his encompassing descriptions, which were spare and rich at the same time.
There is wry humour present in many of the poems, including the hopeful Happy Kites by Moez Surani, in which the writer dreams of a future in which “we amble towards/each other in old age and fence/timidly with our canes” before waking “into that guest bedroom of yours/ that was absurd with sunlight.” Those last three words in particular made me smile with recognition.
Dream Catcher is a dense package of ideas and imagery, a magazine to savour at length rather than flick through. The contents require some effort on the part of the reader, which is no bad thing, rewarding our concentration with a collection that deserves a space on a bookshelf, to be read time and again.
To subscribe or submit please visit www.dreamcatchermagazine.co.uk
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