silver me away!

My friend, Garrison Keillor

inspiration, on going

and fine radio, too

Poetry Everywhere

Just look at the fun heading our way. Go ahead, click on it!

The trail ahead finds Poetry Everywhere

From the site, hosted by Garrison Kellior:

"WGBH and David Grubin Productions, in association with the Poetry Foundation, undertook this project in order to expose a diverse audience to a broad spectrum of poetic voices, build an appreciation and an audience for poetry, and increase the presence of poets and poetry within the two most ubiquitous media in American popular culture–the Web and TV. In addition to presentation on this Web site, the videos will appear on local public television stations at unexpected moments during their broadcast schedules. The partners hope that poetry will become a permanent part of the PBS landscape, offering moments of meditation and even revelation throughout the day.

The poetry films of Seamus Heaney, Philip Levine, and Charles Simic were created by Leita Luchetti.

Independent of the videos created for PBS, 34 animated films were created by students working with docUWM, a documentary media center at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and the university’s creative writing program, in association with the Poetry Foundation. Aiming to focus a new generation of filmmakers on poetry as subject matter, the project encouraged film students to read widely from the canon of contemporary poetry and, working closely with poets and scholars, effectively translate poetry to the screen using an array of film and animation techniques. The student-produced films were supervised by Liam Callanan, a creative writing professor at the UW-Milwaukee School of Letters and Science, and Brad Lichtenstein, a Peck School of the Arts film instructor."

Watch, listen, enjoy.

New Comer

Little Bear from Yukon Territory.

Tawny and the Winged Tiger

Five train cars loaded with ammonia washed into the Upper Sacramento affecting all things downstream. Tawny left when the river flooded. Her kin knew sickness, driven by greed and chilled by blindness. An ancient survival mechanism was terribly awry.

Many determined footsteps led North. She slowed when hemlock met the salty shore. Paused next to breathe the air from crowns of wild ice. Tawny opened her shoulder sack for water and nuts near tree line. With her snowshoes stuck down into the slope she suspended her legs above the wet. Crunching and listening to the forest, she inhaled the only sunny patch on the hillside.

Then, Mountain Dweller, the Great Horned Owl invited her to nest. His courting song, resonant, deep and complicated, rumbled her core. He and the afternoon wind promised to share a stable fragility.

Hidden from the bright light filling his home, food from every forest niche lay in storage boxes. His orange face and gentle accomplished manner sparked and challenged; a mentor offering to teach her the finesse of survival.

Starlight and the snowy moon were used for hunting. Dawn found them processing their catch; rabbit, fish, grouse. January brought them three eggs, so their afternoons were spent nesting. The lovers shared the effort by plucking down or tufting fur to insulate the quiet, white orbs.

A weight filled their hearts when nothing resulted from these efforts and a ritual dinner was made from the eggs. They promised to try again next year. Over many seasons of failed hatches, they finally accepted this fate.

Mountain Dweller told the story of his long ago wives who came to the forest during unusually lean years in their village. They had repeatedly broken the law, taking more than they needed and at the threshold of their womanhood were banished, ordered to leave to subsist on their own.

From his perch, he watched, enamored by their determination. They accepted his invitation to share the homes he’d built and to learn the great secrets of subsisting lightly and well.

Eventually the women were needed to care for their aging relatives. He requested they return and pay off their debt. He sent them with a thimble size basket, woven long ago, magically holding an ample supply of meats and fruit; love from the forest. Down through the decades of great ice and the years of wild change, Mountain Dweller, in his solitary, generous way, helped to steady the beat.

It was time for Tawny to go. To find a way to teach the youth from where she’d come. Back in the city she kept her bushy tail tucked beneath britches and a skirt.

The Path Ahead

So, my Cadillac arrived early last fall. It's an inheritance gift provided by my frugal Momma, T.M. Revenaugh.

Back in 1947, as a newlywed, she traveled several hundred miles from Adrian to her childhood home of Calumet, Mich. with R.L. Revenaugh on twin Schwinns.
The plan after the shakedown cruise, was to pedal across the continent to Eugene, Oregon. There Richard would complete his senior year at the U. of O.
T.M. had graduated the year before with plans to become a college professor of English Lit.
They quickly found that the shake down cruise to the U.P. was plenty. They loaded the bikes on a Greyhound bus and headed west in late August.

Until her dying day, Mom maintained that the trip set the stage for the next 20 years! I'm ready for a similar experience.

My beauty is a Kona Ute, the SUV's of road bikes.

I was able to give it a few test runs along the highway, enough to know I was hooked on the notion of distance biking with a fine piece of equipment.

So, come spring, cycling the 39 miles from our homestead to town along the Haines Hwy. will allow me to train and see what I've got. The Ute can carry an additional 100 lbs. distributed between the panniers and across the fin-deck.

I'd like to take on the Golden Circle route up through B.C. to the Yukon, across and down to Skagway in time for the North Words Writer's Symposium in July.

The BIG TRIP ~via~ the rails-to-trails from Alaska to the mid-west is still shimmering on the horizon (I've skeins of yarn to spin and dye - Farmer's Market and shops to supply. Best get to Kraken!)

Here's a hats off to all Alaskan writers. 49 Writers , is fine portal to explore.

Also, special nods to Sockeye Cycle. Those inclined towards learning more about cycling through our region will enjoy the images and information offered by our local cycle shop.

Big happy January planning to you each!