<\/a><\/p>\n

Recently I was given this book by a friend. I had never heard of Robert Kroetsch before, and was working my way towards the book when I found out the author had just passed away in a car crash near Edmonton. And so although I have only read this one book of his (his last) I would say that Alberta has certainly lost a great writer. A favourite from his last collection:<\/p>\n

Afterthought 2<\/strong><\/p>\n

A tree is a kind of calendar, our teacher
\nexplained, each ring in the wood a year,
\neach tree a memory of itself, a history<\/p>\n

of the place and time of its growing.
\nOur teacher said we might bring
\na sample to class. I was a good student.<\/p>\n

My father’s favourite tree was a Manitoba maple.
\nIt stood at the edge of our garden.
\nIt gave him shade on hot summer days.<\/p>\n

What I did was, I cut down my father’s
\nfavourite tree. With a handsaw.
\nThen I cut off a slice from the fallen trunk.<\/p>\n

The rings in the wood were a wonder.
\nI counted the rings. I went and told my father,
\nYou are the same age as a tree.<\/p>\n

My father said, Where did you find that
\nslice of wood? I was proud of myself.
\nThat tree at the edge of the garden, I said.<\/p>\n

I wasn’t lying. He could see the evidence
\nfor himself. If he wanted to. I asked him
\nto help me check my counting.<\/p>\n

A tree is a kind of calendar. I remember
\nmy father, after a moment, managed to smile.
\nHe taught me that love has many seasons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently I was given this book by a friend. I had never heard of Robert Kroetsch before, and was working my way towards the book when I found out the author had just passed away in a car crash near Edmonton. And so although I have only read this one book of his (his last) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=342"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":351,"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342\/revisions\/351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/andsoon.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}