T Minus 18 days to Launch!

I attended a wonderful book launch yesterday at the Simone de Beauvoir Institute of Concordia University. This is the first time I’ve ever visited the Institute, which houses the oldest women’s studies programme in Canada.

The book being launched was RE:GENERATIONS: Canadian Women Poets in Converstion. Di Brandt, one of the editors was present, as well as a number of the included poets: Cornelia Hoogland, Sharon Nelson, Carolyn Zonailo, and Susan McMaster. Inspiring readings by all the authors and a good reminder that we owe much to previous generations of writers. The women writers who were singled out for praise were not foreign, but our own Canadian women poets. I’m looking now for my volume of poems by Dorothy Livesay and also want to buy a book of P.K. Page’s poems. As well, I have to read that book that a number of women have told me they have absolutely loved: Elizabeth Smart’s By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept.

I enjoyed being in such a nurturing, pro-women environment as the Institute and am glad I went, even though I was pretty tired. But, as luck would have it, as I was in the metro on the way there, a woman sat down next to me and just happened to be carrying, not one, not two, but three dozen roses! The scent was intoxicating and the colours—cream, orange and yellow—just glorious. My flower heart immediately responded and I sported a huge smile that I didn’t lose for the next hour or so.

I arrived too early for the launch so walked for a few minutes up to Sherbrooke and suddenly noticed the sculpture of two hearts in front the Musee des beaux arts. It’s called "Twin 6’ Hearts" and is by the American sculptor Jim Dine. I’m going to get some flowers and have a photo taken of myself in front of it for Flower Heart publicity. These days it seems there are flowers and hearts wherever I go. Heard back from the printer as well—Flower Heart the book is already being printed.

T minus 19 days to launch!

A beautiful day today. I treated my son to the first ice-cream of the year at Crème Boboule, a local Verdun institution. I made good progress on my press kit today and now have invitations to send out to the launch of Flower Heart, thanks to William Yin at Kaison Tech, another Verdun business on Wellington street.

Even after almost fifteen years in Verdun I still don’t feel as if belong here. Yet what does it mean to belong somewhere? When I was growing up in Lillooet, a village along the Fraser Canyon in British Columbia, I longed to escape narrow confinement and go out into "the world." When my parents retired to Saskatoon, I never felt at home in that prairie city. When I came to Montreal I thought it would be a place I passed through on my way to "the world." And still, here I am, living in Verdun, putting the geraniums out on the front balcony and thinking about the play I want to write and my road novel, staring Claudia, a Verdun girl who found herself on the wrong side of the law and now wants to escape Verdun and head West. In fact, she will end up in my own hometown, Lillooet, in search of her long-lost brother.

I’ve never known quite what to think of this novel. I began it after hearing a teisho by Albert Low, head of the Montreal Zen Centre. In the teisho he was telling the story of a student who came to his master and asked what he had to do to become enlightened, and the master roared "go!" And so I began my "road novel." Two creative works born here in Verdun. Both of them seem foreign to me in the same way that Verdun does.

What am I so afraid of? Am I afraid to put down roots? Or is it just that I’m like a rootless plant, one that survives somehow on just air and light. I wish though I could discover the knack of being happy where I am .

One of the haiku from Flower Heart that people really seem to like is the following, which is so simple it hardly seems a poem:

What does a flower
care
where it blooms?

The Press Release

Here's the press release for the launch of Flower Heart.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Re: Flower Heart
ISBN: 0-9738738-1-7
124 pages
Suggested retail price: $14.95

Book Launch

Discover Your Flower Heart!

MONTREAL - Local author Angela Leuck launches her latest book Flower Heart Tuesday, May 9th, 2006, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Fraser-Hickson Library, 4855 Kensington Avenue in N.D.G.—just in time for gardening season.

"But you don’t have to be a gardener to enjoy flowers," says Leuck, "all you have to do is look." Leuck lives above a shop in Verdun and doesn’t herself have the opportunity to garden. Instead, for the past 7 years, she has explored the world of flowers in the city and recorded her observations using the popular, short Japanese nature poem called haiku.

Recent studies suggest what gardeners have always known—that yard work is relaxing and good exercise. But just looking at a garden can also be good for you. A study conducted at the University of California at Irvine shows that people exposed to greenery had decreased blood pressure and elevated mood, some in just a few minutes.
But what if you are too busy or, like many urban dwellers, don’t have the opportunity to potter in a garden? "No problem," says Leuck, who includes a section in her book on where to find flowers in the city year round.

Leuck first became aware of the importance of flowers through the Montreal chapter of Ikebana International, the Japanese minimalist school of flower arranging. There she learned about the ancient concept of hana no kokoro or "flower heart." The Japanese masters believed that working with flowers could create "gentleness of spirit," a quality they greatly prized. In her book, Leuck updates this ancient concept to the modern urban world.

A single parent of a child with Asperger’s, Leuck says that through writing the over 200 poems in the book she found a great deal of serenity and is definitely working on developing further her own flower heart. The launch is an opportunity for everyone to discover their own flower hearts, with special invited guests from the horticultural community and more. The event is free and everyone is welcome.

Info: Andrew Cook-Jolicœur 514 524-8762 andrew@blueginkgopress.com
Angela Leuck 514 766-3782 acleuck@angelaleuck.com

* * *

I also received this wonderful blurb from Ann Goldring, author of the successful children's book Spitfire and herself a fine haiku poet.

"Leave your busyness at the garden gate, and step among Angela Leuck's flowers. Stop at the tulips and think about that one pink tulip in a sea of yellow ones. Count the neighbour's nine purple hyacinths—nine!— and sense the lilac before you see them around the bend. 'Flower Heart' is bound to stir the hearts and souls of children and grown-ups alike."

Ann Goldring, Past Vice President, Haiku Canada

T Minus 21 Days to Launch!

or

"Verdun en fleurs"

An important rule of baseball and life: Keep your eye on the ball! Today I lost my focus on the launch of Flower Heart on the 9th and instead got another event underway—a celebration of writers of the South West region of Montreal, which means Verdun, Pointe St. Charles and probably also Ville Emard and Lasalle. The proposed event would take place at the end of summer to coincide with the popular Verdun sidewalk sale.

Caroline Filler and her mother are owners of Encor-Lire, a used bookstore on the corner of Wellington and 3rd Avenue, and just one block away from my apartment. It’s always a pleasure to speak to Caroline; she has great energy and an unforgetable laugh. She purchased the bookstore less than a year ago and moved it to its present location. Turns out she’s involved in various Verdun business/development groups and thinks that an event highlighting Verdun and area writers would fit in with the new focus on things cultural. She suggested we put together a proposal and request some funding.

This year the Gazette declared Verdun the "in" place to be—the New Plateau. For those of you who don’t know Montreal, "The Plateau" has been the place in Montreal where writers and artists hang out. I love the Plateau, but could never afford to live there. Neither can a lot of other struggling creatives and many of us have found a refuge here in Verdun, with cheap rents on large apartments with wood pillars and lots of stained-glass windows, all with the added bonus of miles of St. Lawrence riverbank.

One quite extraordinary thing about Verdun is that it’s home to playwright David Fennario. There are a number of other writers as well in French and English. (I should mention too, Vittorio Rossi, who grew up in neighbouring Ville Emard.) So, there is definitely a lot of talent in this region of Montreal that we will turn the spotlight on next September.

But getting back to the launch, I did do a few small things today. Tomorrow, though, I’ll really get at the launch in earnest. Still, I think it’s important to realize that Flower Heart had its origins, not on tree-shaded streets with beautiful, lush gardens, but here in working class Verdun. I recall hearing about that women’s march to Quebec City a number of years ago to protest poverty. Their symbols were bread and roses. I didn’t understand it at the time, but I know now why they carried roses. Flowers are about hope. And I guess the 201 haiku included in Flower Heart are a lot about that.

T minus 22 days to launch!

Here's what my publisher and I came up with today as part of our publicity for Flower Heart.

Flower Heart,
the making of…

Who? Ex-economist-turned-poet Angela Leuck.

What? Flower Heart is a book of poems inspired by the ancient ikebana concept of hana no kokoro or
‘’flower heart,’’ adapted by Leuck to the contemporary world.

When? A 7-year odyssey involving flowers and the shortest poetry form in the world: haiku.

Where? Here in Montreal, in her own working class neighbourhood of Verdun, along the St. Lawrence River, in parks and greenhouses and at the Botanical Garden.

Why? Search for serenity—Leuck is a single parent of a child with Asperger’s, as recently profiled in
The Gazette.

In addition, I sent an email off to Richard Reynolds, the leader of a group of guerilla gardeners in London, England. He was mentioned in an April 8th article in The Times written by Will Pavia and entitled, "Blooming street craze that leaves authorities seeing green." Reynolds has a friendly and non-threatening website and has set a goal--I'm the kind of person who really believes in the power of goals--of 100 verified acts of guerilla gardening on four continents by September 1st. I'll admit that I've entertained the idea myself of spreading some seeds along the St. Lawrence here in Montreal. In fact, I wrote a tanka about it:

The urge to go
and scatter seeds
down by the river
to see if I could set
the world abloom.

On his website Reynolds offers to link people up with other gardening guerillas in their area. I asked him to let me know if there are any such persons in Montreal. There are a lot in Toronto and well organized. I'm on their email list now too. I wonder where all of this is leading. It's amazing how taking just one step can change the landscape before us, present us vistas we never knew were there. But I guess it's all part of the journey and what makes it so interesting.

T MINUS 23 DAYS TO LAUNCH TIME!

Now that my book Flower Heart is off to the printers, I can finally start thinking about the launch on Tuesday, May 9th, 5 pm to 8 pm at the Fraser-Hickson Library Auditorium. That's only 23 days from now! But if there's one thing I've learnt from flowers, it's that I shouldn't worry so much about deadlines. Can you imagine a cherry tree getting into a state of panic, because next month it will have to be in full blossom. Or a tea rose, awakening from its winter slumber and thinking, oh, my God, in a few weeks I will have to be in bloom, and look at me, not even a leaf! No, everything proceeds along at a calm steady pace until, voila, the splendour of spring surrounds us.

So, even though I don't have my press release done, the invitations and posters still have to be designed, I'm going to just relax and assume that everything will bloom beautifully in its own time. Tomorrow I will be getting together with my publisher, Andrew Cook-Jolicoeur, founder of Blue Ginkgo Press, to work on publicity. In the meatime, I have been looking on the internet and learning a lot about flowers that I didn't know before.

Just today I found out about Horticulture Therapy, which is a well-established, recognized branch of therapy. The Canadian Horticultural Therapy Association, 250 members strong, is committed to spreading the word about this form of therapy, which is used to help people with Alzheimer's, substance abuse, mental illness, brain, injury, visual impairment, as well as other disabilities. When I first came up with the idea for Flower Heart, I saw it as my own personal journey of finding serenity through flowers. I didn't realize that it is part of a larger movement that recognizes the healing power of nature and especially flowers as actual therapy. I'm hoping that Flower Heart will be of interest to professionals in Horticulture Therapy and look forward to hearing their response to my poems.