Whazzat?

"Intriguing musings with a comic edge and a deeper underlay lead mind and heart on a pleasurable wander down paths where 'Expectancy is, reliably, the most we can have.' By profession a philosopher, Nash’s  lyrical interweavings of metaphysics and myth, bombs and elevators, quarrels and beer, dystopia and hope, are braided through with a pliable, iridescent thread of wisdom. "

- Susan McMaster, past president, League of Canadian Poets

"Roger Nash is a natural philosopher (naturally) of the natural beauty, wit, and charm of nature. In poems that are both insightful and delightful, playful yet acutely aware of the world in which his poet's eye deciphers the intricacy of life, Nash gives us a collection that is not only worth reading but worthy of the delight he engenders with every poem and every line." -

Bruce Meyer, poet laureate, Barrie, Ont.

Whazzat? explores how poetry invites us to look at things differently, with a sense of surprise, a whazzat. It looks at paradoxes we meet in life, and ways of resolving them through shifts of perspective. Poems cluster in four sections around paradoxes in different parts of our lives. Can we square the sheer unpredictability of events – especially with climate change – with our recurring need for certainty? Can we revitalize downtown cores without losing a sense of our past? In our personal lives, can we see unavoidable paradoxes as “gifts” that heighten our sense of wonder, rather than threatening to divide us in two? Is there a “now” we can live in, or do we inevitably live in our pasts and imagined futures? A number of poems have been previously published in literary magazines and anthologies across Canada, the U.K. and the U.S.A. This collection draws them together.

About the Author

Roger Nash