Margaret Avison, a much-celebrated Canadian poet described as “one of the great religious poets” of the 20th century—and who spent a while sojourning among Presbyterians at Knox, Spadina, Toronto, from the 1960s to the 1990s—passed away at age 89 on July 27 from complications following hip surgery after a fall. She won the prestigious Griffin Poetry Prize four years ago and was twice a winner of the Governor General's Award for poetry in a literary career that spanned 40 years. Her first award-winning book of poetry, Winter Sun, was published in 1960. She became what she called a “committed Christian” in 1963 by “listening” more deeply to the message of the Bible and, after that time, as is so evident in her next book, The Dumbfounding (1966), she often wrote about her deeply held, yet private, personal Christian faith. Many critics compare her work to the great metaphysical poets of the 17th century.
I met Margaret in the early 1970s. We met at Evangel Hall, a social service ministry of the church in Toronto. I was a rather callow, uninformed student at the time and she must have noticed this by my fumbling words about her work. True to her outspoken nature, she tartly told me that she wasn't doing social work there “to help” people; she was simply showing up, being there, where God wanted her to be! She graciously left me with a fresh poem in my markedup copy of The Dumbfounding, entitled Re: Luke 13:22-33, and dated March 16, 1971. I do not believe it has ever been published so I would like to share it as a tribute to her seemingly artless, yet great artistic skill and abiding Christian faith, which has often sustained and illuminated me in my own personal devotions.
The Kingdom-come Voice tells us to make for the o-be-joyful fiesta as our King makes for the tree. 'Everybody, of course?' Only the few who force their way through the door that must crush the First, before. 'How can we help but run away from the war when the One gets killed and the others die & leave us alone in the way?' The two to Emmaus were three with an o-be-joyful at close of day. 'O such be our finding always!'
Her other volumes include No Time, Not Yet but Still, and Concrete and Wild Carrots. I will miss her voice. I heartily recommend her work to you!
