["Functional Poetry: A Proposal"] establishes Dudek as the contemporary Canadian poet most consciously concerned with shape, form and sound: the origins of rhythm. He feels that the widening scope of prose rhythm has set up an impasse for poetry which he would like to break through…. His aim apparently is to invade the fortress where prose has taken hold and return it to the rightful owner, poetry…. (pp. 26-7)

Before he reached this eighteenth century critical position Dudek as man and poet went through many phases. His earliest poetry in East of the City is lyrical and imagist: concerned not with sound effects so much as with pictures in rhythmic arrangement. Already the clouds and the sea he is so fond of observing represent his objective correlative for the world of poetry: a world where recurrent rhythms subject to wind and weather, subject to sun and moon, are...