Yukon Take It With You

May 2026 Poetry Update

Hi friends,

This week my family and I left the Yukon, where we’ve been living since the end of February. Being the Writer in Residence at Berton House was everything I could’ve hoped for. On a personal level, I got to show my wife and kids the place that formed me. On an artistic level, I got to fully immerse myself in being a writer for two whole months.

So what’s new since my April update? Lots.

I’ll start with the new poems. My poem “Garments of Skin” was recently published at Traces Journal. This one owes a bit to Jonathan Pageau (IYKYK). Here’s the first bit:

Cast out from the garden
In garments of skin
We begged for a pardon
To enter back in

This wide world rests under
The thumb of its God
We set out to plunder
The wildlands of Nod

The seal of the chrism
The vellum stretched thin
We bind up our wisdom
In garments of skin …

Read the whole thing here. Thanks as always to fearless editor Maya Venters.

Also recently, my poem “Midday Moon” was published at Forgotten Ground Regained. This is one I’ve been drafting and redrafting for several years, so it’s nice to see it out in the world. Here’s the middle stanza:

Midday moon
Your face like bone
Your faded frameless forehead
Your cheeks
And chin
Your jagged glass-gashed grin
You’re cratered miscreated sky-corroded

Read the whole thing here. Thanks to editor and alliteration advocate Paul Deane.

Those are the poems that have come out since my last update. But mostly, that last month was spent experiencing the Yukon. Dawson City is so much fun. I miss everyone there. I loved getting the opportunity to immerse myself in the community. Head over to my instagram (generously curated by my wife) for some pictures of our adventures.

Aside from just getting to live in the Yukon, I got to do a lot of writerly stuff too. I wrote lots of new poems. I did poetry readings at both the Dawson and Whitehorse public libraries. The Dawson reading was particularly fun. I apparently had the second biggest turnout ever (after Lawrence Hill).

I also appeared on CBC Yukon a second time on my way out to discuss my experience at Berton House. You can listen to that here.

I’m sad it’s all over, but there’s more to come. I have some poems from my time there I’m excited about. I hope I can share them soon. Don’t go anywhere.

J.