The Significance of Moths

By Shirley Camia

This latest collection of poems, “The Significance of Moths,” is an examination of life in Canada within a Filipino context. The title corresponds to a Filipino superstition that moths embody the souls of those who have recently passed on: though the person has died, the spirit still lingers, like a memory to an experience long gone. Much of the poems have been created within this framework, and focus on how the acts of remembering, and uncovering truths, ultimately influence the present.

Through short poems, this work tackles issues that range from the emotional, such as loss and longing, to the more practical, such as the socio-economic hardships of adjusting to life in the diaspora. These poems include the conflict felt by second-generation Canadians who are trying to live within two cultures, and are trying to appease their families and communities while carving out their own western identities.

The collection is organized in four sections, from winter to fall, which reflect the four distinct seasons in Winnipeg. They indicate the passage of time, from the barren isolation of winter to the preparation of hibernation in the autumn. The notion of home, which figures prominently in the collection, parallels the seasons, as one experiences a certain metaphorical death by cutting off life in one place to form a new existence, by settling in a foreign land (with all the joys and hardship that experience entails). The question, however, remains: is home a physical reality or is it formed in memories and ideas? The poems in Moths reflect that internal conflict with which migrants, and their children, are often confronted, as they navigate "what is" with the ghosts of "what was."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Turnstone Press
• Release date: Apr 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9780888015341

Shirley Camia

Poet and journalist Shirley Camia is the author of three works of poetry:Children Shouldn't Use Knives and Other Tales, The Significance of Moths, and Calliope. Cindy Mochizuki has created installation, performance, animation, drawings, and collaborative works that have exhibited nationally and internationally.

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The Significance of Moths

Shirley Camia

The Significance of Moths

copyright © Shirley Camia 2015

Turnstone Press

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Winnipeg, MB

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Turnstone Press gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Manitoba Arts Council, the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund, and the Province of Manitoba through the Book Publishing Tax Credit and the Book Publisher Marketing Assistance Program.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Camia, Shirley, 1979-, author

The significance of moths / Shirley Camia.

Poems.

ISBN 978-0-88801-533-4 (pbk.)