About this ebook
Some colours of glazes result from reduction that aren’t achieved in oxidation. It may also be that the fuel–starved fire pulls oxygen from the clay itself, and in doing so draws elements from deep in the clay up to the glaze. This can make it harder to determine the precise outcome of the glazed piece.
Reduction can even change the texture of the clay. --
Jennifer Yeates Camara is a contemporary Canadian poet with a distinctly condensed style, what you might call a reduction of verse.
In this first collection spanning over 25 years, she was inspired by some of the standouts of classical world poetry, including traditional Japanese haiku, Tang Chinese poets Li Po (Li Bai) and Du Fu (Tu Fu), Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore, and even Biblical Hebrew poetry, as well as English and Canadian literature.
While Jennifer enjoys different forms of poetry (including the occasional sonnet), the style mostly seen in Reduction Fired is architectural. As Frank Lloyd Wright said, "'Think simple' as my old master used to say - meaning reduce the whole of its parts into the simplest terms, getting back to first principles."
Here, lines are built only long enough to hold what is needed. Intimate feelings and rich visuals are described in everyday language that is clear and calm. The minimal verse at times is broken where the lines stand alone or the words at those points become different phrases with those before or after.
Many poems use parallels, or rhymes of thought, to keep ideas finely connected. Yet routinely, they take the reader to unexpected endings. Most are short shots - they may be quickly swallowed but keenly felt. And there is ever a rhythm throughout Jennifer's writings.
The events described in these poems are common to many, as they typically involve relationships of one kind or another (like in the popular 'Chalk Drawings'). However, on occasion, Jennifer's poor beginnings, her dear friend's suicide, her spouse's disassociation from the family through addiction and her eventual mental breakdown do reveal themselves in certain poems or phrases.
Reduction Fired is set out in 4 sections, each named for a season that represents a period in time. Specifically, they are grouped loosely in the reverse order they were written, with those under "Winter" being more recent poems from Jennifer's early 40s, penned when she was ill, and those under "Spring" being a few of her poems from her early 20s. Also, each poem's illustrations and symbolism are often taken from nature.
There are further subgroups of poems for different subjects; for example, "Chalk Drawings" processes the emotions Jennifer felt when a man who appeared romantically interested in her revealed he had someone else in mind all along. On a similar note, "W.A.M.W." refers to her feelings for an older man who was beyond reach.
Structurally, Jennifer attempts to break lines where they may suggest more than one meaning, or lead the reader down one path only to make an abrupt turn at the end. Admittedly, striving for this enjambment may muddle the meaning for some readers, yet the author hopes that those readers who wish might enjoy contemplating the multiple possibilities and the chosen outcome.
Jennifer presently works as a paralegal and lives with her son Mohamed in Vancouver, Canada. For more information on Jennifer, her influences and her photos, please visit yeatescamara.com.
About the author
Jennifer Yeates Camara is a contemporary poet living in Vancouver, Canada.
Her early years were unusual in some ways. She is the youngest of 13 children. Her family lived in Southern Ontario, Canada, but they were distinctly poor. Their old house was free; in fact, their father was paid money to take it away. He bought 5 acres of rural land to put it on, but at the time that land was just inside a zone for middle-class families, so the house had to meet a minimum square footage requirement. He measured into every closet under the eaves, and just made it. Despite its setting, their house had no running water or other plumbing and only wood heat.
Jennifer's sister Regan wrote a thoughtful and humorous article about that time, 'Eau de Toilet: The Fragrance of My Youth', available through regannuqui.com. Regan also wrote about going to school in those circumstances and the transformative nature of a few people's graciousness (a most underrated quality) in her essay 'Elephants in the Classroom, and the Teacher Who Conquered Them', which was published in Canada's The Globe and Mail in January 2019. With that kind of support, Regan skipped 2 grades in primary school and was the first in the family to go to University. She is now an accountant as well as a writer.
Jennifer has benefited from the influence and traits of her family members, many of whom write in some form. Her father Charlie had been trained as a stationary engineer and her mother Barbara was an avid reader. Both parents enjoyed poetry and other forms of writing, and they were supportive of learning and the arts. Barbara was exposed to art from her relatives. For example, her father Owen had been a keen amateur oil painter and photographer with a love of the outdoors (he had been a cowboy in Alberta, and a park warden in Ontario). He went on the occasional painting trip to Temagami with fellow Welshman Frederick Varley of the Group of Seven.
Barbara, for her part, had an interest in pottery. She scrounged enough once to splurge on ceramic classes at Georgian College, which in the 60s happened to be taught by the renowned Canadian artists, Robin Hopper, Roman Bartkiw and Ann Mortimer. She found she liked glazes most of all. Robin Hopper's book, The Ceramic Spectrum, describes the achievable colour options for glazes as near limitless. Barbara was even invited to move to an artist colony in Big Sur, California, by a couple who did pottery but were not interested in glazes themselves and who thought they would make a good team. At the time though, the U.S. had the military draft on, and since Barbara had one son already of military age and another growing fast, she reluctantly turned them down. Charlie eventually joined Barbara's class, and when it came time to choose two student pieces from the class for display, a piece from each of them was chosen.
Years later, when Jennifer was 9 years old, her mother moved with the youngest 4 children to the coastal area of British Columbia. Jennifer liked her first French lessons in grade 5 of primary school, and she was thrilled the local school system offered a late French immersion program starting from grade 6 (taught by the extraordinary Ms. Chin). It was around that time that Jennifer also started writing her own poetry.
Although Jennifer excelled at language arts and maths throughout secondary school, she often turned to poetry to express herself. At one point in her final year, she was dating a young man, Dan, who attended another school. He became sick for two weeks and got behind in homework, including a poem required for English class. Jennifer helped out by giving him one of her own to submit. Dan's teacher was so impressed with it, he had Dan discuss it for the whole class (thankfully, Dan was good at improv), and told the rest of the class to re-write their poems as they clearly hadn't taken the time and attention that Dan had.
Once Jennifer started working, she discovered a bookstore near her office, and was eagerly introduced by its owners to a range of poetry from various cultures, not just Canada, the U.S. and the UK, but also Persia, China, Japan and India.
During that period Jennifer also explored Biblical poetry and its unique aspects, like vivid verbs, concrete words for abstract concepts, short conjunctions for flow, and rhymes of thought -- parallel ideas or words used purposefully to connect different lines and allow groupings to make multiple points -- and she passed many nights listening to recordings of the psalms.
Later, like her grandfather and photog brother Morgan, Jennifer also found photography to be a creative outlet.
More about Jennifer, her influences, and her photos can be found on yeatescamara.com and https://fineartamerica.com/
