Brad Cran's highly anticipated second book of poetry, Ink on Paper, is a compelling collection of political poems that seek to elucidate our relationships with our surroundings as well as those who surround us. Cran, former Poet Laureate for the City of Vancouver, masterfully constructs images held in contradictory tension, as in his civic poem, "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Grey Whale and Ending with a Line from Rilke":

And there you were
below the mountains
in the heart of the city
gazing at the grey whale.
You must change your life.

Cran's poems are a fresh, provocative examination of urban culture, the natural world and issues of social justice, told with keen awareness and a gritty poetic precision.

Brad Cran is the publisher of Smoking Lung Press, a contributing editor at Geist Magazine, an event host at the Vancouver International Writers Festival and the former executive director for the Federation of BC Writers. His poetry has appeared in publications across Canada including The Globe and Mail and in the anthologies Breaking the Surface, Hammer & Tongs and Why I Sing the Blues. He has appeared on CBC radio, Book Television, Chek 6 Television, and been profiled in The Georgia Straight, The Vancouver Sun, Monday Magazine, The Westender, The National Post and First Chapter: The Canadian Writers Photography Project.

Brad Cran's profile page

Cran has found a public voice that emerges from plain speech and stays rigorously clear of the declamatory, the polemical, the sentimental; the result is always compelling and at times harrowing.
--Stephen Osborne, Geist

Cran is a master at getting us to see the transformative. These writings are the chronicles of a mind steeped in social awareness, probing the possibilities of true connection with the world, improvement of the human lot, and redemption of the soul through love and family... Ink on Paper is a reassurance that there is a formidable thinker in our midst who has the courage and literary tools to help others comprehend.
--Dennis E. Bolen, Vancouver Sun

Ink on Paper, Cran's second book of poetry kicks the crap out of any second book suspicion. It is a tiny book that reads like a massive tome. It is chocked full of wisdom and gravitas and instructions for civilized living.
--Michael Dennis, Michael Dennis Blog

These are poems designed to communicate, without pretense or highfalutin obscurity: civic poems. Moving and provocative, they work so well when read aloud.
--Kevin McNeilly, Frank Styles Blog

Ink on Paper by Brad Cran, poet laureate for Vancouver,...presents poetry with a strong message about social issues.
--John Taylor, Midwest Book Review