Poet Margaret Christakos, throughout her eight previous poetry collections, has created ruptures and splices inside of and against the limits of the confessional lyric, often using recombinatory procedures, cyclical and serial structure, and enmeshing intimate vernacular with highly aestheticized language in writing that explores maternality, sexuality and intimate address.

In her new collection, Multitudes –Â?Â? where cellphone tweets snipe 'y wd I nd/ 2 spk 2 u?' alongside echoes of aria, chant and dirge –Â?Â? Christakos freshly pairs Whitman's 'Song of Myself' with an inquiry into the subjective thresholds of digital social media, where individuals conduct flamboyant acts of self-Â?portraiture, testimonial, self-Â?commodification, erotic selfÂ?-dispersal and indelible spectacle.

Multitudes is a moving, witty, poetic foray into a modern frontier of public spaces (city hall square, park, cemetery, bicycle path), poetic forms, private longings and virtual relocations. With her trademark linguistic sonar, Christakos amplifies the capacity of language to discern an almost inherent swingdoor between 'moaning' and 'meaning,' while casting a discouraged eye on how human discernment is used to rigidify recognitions, inviting citizens to turn from ethical social activism to snitch on their Facebook friends after an urban hockey riot.

'Alphabetic dismantling, syntactic play, essaying words backwards and 4words (as she might say), Christakos manifests forensic clarity and telegraphic fortitude in this unsettling work.' Â?– Rachel Blau DuPlessis

Margaret Christakos is attached to this earth. Born and raised in Sudbury, Ontario, she has worked as a poet, writer, editor, instructor, and poetry-culture builder in Toronto since the late 1980s. Her body of work includes nine collections of poetry, numerous chapbooks, a novel, and an inter-genre memoir. She has been shortlisted for the Trillium Book Award and the Pat Lowther Memorial Award, and is a recipient of the ReLit Award for poetry and the Bliss Carman Award. Space Between Her Lips: The Poetry of Margaret Christakos was published in 2017 (Laurier Poetry series). She has held appointments as Writer in Residence at the University of Windsor, Western University, London Public Library, and the University of Alberta. She is associate faculty with the MFA program in creative writing at University of Guelph-Humber and has taught widely as a sessional, most recently at Ryerson University. In 2018–2019, she was Barker Fairley Distinguished Visitor at University College, University of Toronto. She has three adult children and lives in Toronto.

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