"These days serious poets aim for the bone" writes Anna Marie Sewell. They do, and so does she. Writing surface poetry is not Sewell's style. In Fifth World Drum she goes deep and takes her reader with her. Recounting her experiences with identity, her search for culture and spirituality, and work on her craft -- poetry -- Sewell is not afraid to write about reality.

Zionism's roots in Canada are Christian as well. At the time of Confederation Canada's preeminent Christian Zionist was Henry Wentworth Monk. Monk "took part in the first attempt at a Zionist agricultural settlement in Palestine," boasts his biography.

To buy Palestine from the Ottomans (Turkey) in 1875 he began the Palestine Restoration Fund. Unsuccessful, seven years later Monk took out an ad in the Jewish World proposing a "Bank of Israel" to finance Jewish resettlement. A history of the Canadian Jewish community explains:

Two years ago, best friends and daughters of second-wave feminism, Nona Willis Aronowitz and Emma Bee Bernstein climbed into the front seat of a Chevy Cavalier and criss-crossed the United States, talking to more than a hundred young women along the way. The end result of their inspirational journey is Girldrive: Criss-Crossing America, Redefining Feminism, a non-fiction book that looks and reads like a magazine, coupling Aronowitz's critical prose with Bernstein's vibrant photography.

It's refreshing to see a new poet on the scene who brings a different perspective to the privileged life we live as Canadians. Salimah Valiani, a queer activist of colour, brings readers to different places with very different views on what it is to educate and challenge through poetry, letters and memoir.

Packed in the 150 pages that is Valiani's second, and newest, collection, Letter Out: Letter In, are memories, meditations and calls to action through radical thought and crisp sentences. The collection is split in four parts: Letter to South Africa; Letter to Canada; Letter to All; Letter Out: Letter In.