Little Hunger

Shortlisted for the 2009 Governor General’s Literary Award for Poetry

Shortlisted for the Relit Award for Poetry

Philip Kevin Paul’s first book, Taking the Names Down from the Hill won the 2004 Dorothy Livesay Award for Poetry. In Little Hunger, his second book for the WSA,NEC (Saanich) Nation of Vancouver Island, Paul continues to draw upon the rich oral culture and traditions of his people.

From the eye of a whale rising from the deep, to an albino pigeon being nursed back to health, Paul’s work addresses nature, family and traditions that get passed on from generation to generation. A raccoon’s eyes become holy doors of lost keys and sockeye swim upstream. With elegance and wisdom, Paul speaks of the stories gone sad, / singing to the hunger that made them, / running past the voices no longer speaking.