Inside the Poem is a book of poems and essays. It emphasizes the range of poetry in Canada and demonstrates numerous contemporary approaches to the reading of individual poems. The collection brings together twenty-eight new poems by such writers as Daniel David Moses, P.K. Page, Al Purdy, Lola Lemire Tostevin, Fred Wah, and Phyllis Webb and twenty-seven essays by such writers as Diana Brydon, Manina Jones, Pauline Butling, George Woodcock, Sandra Djwa, and Stephen Scobie. The essays use a variety of reading techniques--historical, feminist, political, semiotic, biographical, linguistic, and structural--to discuss the language and impact of poetry, its imaginative force, and social preoccupations. The collection, which honors the career of Donald Stephens, is a useful guide to the art of the poem in Canada and a valuable handbook for those who want to read poetry well.