‘From the back row of the theatre of I Am’ by Angela Rebrec

Winning Poetry

On Sunday at our Holiday Launch we were treated to a wonderful reading of the winner of the 2024 Magpie Award for Poetry, ‘From the back row of the theatre of I Am’ by Angela Rebrec. Final judge Renée Sarojini Saklikar this to say about this fantastic poem:

“Intelligence and a sad-funny wit combine with a narrative form that pulls us in and resonates with unsettling images. The final well-crafted stanza shocks and haunts in equal measure. I kept returning to this one!” – Renée Sarojini Saklikar

Thank you to both Angela and Renée for coming out and sharing their words with us. You can find the full poem in Issue 44, Autumn 2024. In the meantime, here are the opening lines …

From the back row of the theatre of I Am

by Angela Rebrec

Allow yourself the use of assonance—but do not give it up
as an offering. ‘What’s mine is mine.’ Collect your thoughts,
organize them according to weight, in which chapter they first
appeared, alto or soprano, or if they swear like a trucker. Place
them into their proper drawers. Use labels if you must.

Read the rest of this poem in Issue 44, Autumn 2024

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More Magpie Mentions

While this is Angela Rebrec’s first Magpie win, her work has graced our shortlist twice before. Her poem ‘On a Dark Lake’s Edge’ was shortlisted for the 2017 Magpie Award for Poetry, and appeared in Pulp Literature Issue 18, Spring 2018. For the 2020 Magpie Award for Poetry, Angela’s poem ‘A series of opposing reflections in a house of mirrors’ was also shortlisted and was first published in Vallum, Digital Issue 18.1, 2021.

Now, we are delighted to publish this poem here on the blog. Please enjoy ‘A series of opposing reflections in a house of mirrors’ in full below.

A series of opposing reflections in a house of mirrors

by Angela Rebrec

Presumably, when something breaks you 
fix it. Garage door opens—the grinding 
of metal wheels on metal rails rattles 
the bedroom floor

All the records of our conduct: 
lost fortunes and shattered glass, the hole you put 
in the laundry room door. Tonight you’re back
so late

Who are you bearded man who 
alternately shares and does not share 
this home 

now becoming merely a house?
We are contradictions, anomalies that lie 
together at night

where in my dreams I prune 
the unwanted limbs of our marriage, burn them 
in a furious bonfire in the middle of our street

When did you become so bent? 

What made you fervent for always being right
for speaking too loudly in front of the children
no matter what I say

Like rainfall we animate 
parts of the storm—then wait for darkened clouds 
to pass

Once I was something precious—
an emerald, black opal. Now I’m a pimple—
something you seek to cure, something to wish away

The garage door closes. The thud of your footsteps 
crosses the laundry room, down the hallway
the kitchen, then up the flight of stairs

How will you arrive this evening? 

Should I feign sleep—submit 
like the walls of our bedroom, fixed 
to the framing by the hardness of nails?

Sometimes there are no tools that can rebuild
a fractured structure—sometimes demolition 
is all that remains

It makes no difference 
how I find you tonight—

no difference in the way 
your hand turns the knob to the door
in the way the door to our bedroom opens—
this time, so late

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ANGELA REBREC lives and works on the unceded, ancestral lands of the Kwantlen, Tsawwassen, Musqueam, and Stó:lō peoples. A multidisciplinary artist, her writing has appeared in EVENT, Vallum, The Antigonish Review, The Dalhousie Review, and anthologies across North America. She is the editor of Composed: An Anthology of Poetry (Three Ocean Press, 2024).

Angela’s poetry films have garnered recognition at the Barcelona International Film Festival, FilmmakerLife Awards, and Barbara International ShortFest, among others. Her work has also been shortlisted for several competitions, including PRISM International’s Nonfiction Contest. Her 2020 collaboration with composer Mickie Wadsworth for ART SONG LAB was included in NewMusicShelf’s Anthology of New Music for Trans & Nonbinary Voices, Vol. 1.

Angela is passionate about fostering community in the literary arts. She is the founding and current president of the Delta Literary Arts Society, where she continues to inspire and support writers of all levels.