The narrative voice in Samuel Wagan Watson's extraordinary suite of poems Smoke Encrypted Whispers is truly an exercise in multidimensionality, with Watson's tone moves effortlessly between autobiographical memories throughout his life, more immediate “author's notes” on his writing process, and other more elusive forms of exploration. These intimate revelations are sublimated into another, quieter register: that of the Spirit moving in the energy behind all that is formed. This is a cycle of twenty-four vignettes, all of varying distance but all richly encoded with the language of consciousness; the symbol, timeless and born from the presence of experience. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Starting with an evocative scientific warning about smoking, it is clear that you have entered a rarefied space and are participating in the expression of how and why smoking as a symbol has meaning. The warning creates a continuum with which to bless the collection; names the typical negative association with smoking by introducing a subversion: that of spirit and ritual. Watson is a Brisbane-based poet of Bundjalung origin and his people's smoking ritual - which involves burning symbolic natural resources - can be used to welcome people to a particular area, to purify an area or a person, or in the respectful transition attitude in the passing of the elderly that honors people past and present, guaranteeing the future. Watson's is a pervasive smoke in its breadth and completeness; ephemeral, toxic, sacred, and a highly resonant interdimensional symbol that classifies his poems as Greek epics with the “Warning” serving as a prologue. The first formal poem in the collection, “Smoke Signals” not only introduces another iteration of smoking by linking it to a cultural identity, but promotes Greek roots by introducing prose or phonotext captions intertwined with italicized, layered stanzas of poetry that serve as distillations of autobiography – a mode that beautifully realizes the voice of the spirit that exists not only with life but behind it. As the poet writes: “mysteriously moving the world around us, an unknown power”. This shows a remarkable depth of field spanning a period from 1976 to 2003, moving seamlessly within the suburban and coastal landscapes from Brisbane's south side, Cribb Island, Capalaba, returning as an adult. to the eminently and poetically useful Boundary Street in Brisbane's West End, the Berlin Wall and a recitation in a New Zealand pub. Initially, it's contemporary Australian rugby league landscapes, second-hand shops and coastlines where the pulsating rhythm of childhood is always accompanied by ghosts and streaks of smoke from vehicles, industrial sites and fire riddles passed down from his uncle visiting from Arnhem. Earth. There is an eloquence and subtlety revealed only in the second and third readings that show how sublime the sense of internal integrity is; structural choices that transcend simple thematic connections: Watson's domestic streets inspire his first ghosts, which rise "from the bitumen like smoke rings". These poems are an adoration of the notion of kingdom: the way public events - be they New Year's celebrations, street festivals featuring indigenous culture or football matches - unfold as people fish, say their prayers, raise their their children and repair domestic upheavals. of dissolved marriages. Romantic ideals and experience can be shaped by the Muses and spirits.