Poet Laureati: A National Convergence of State Poets, Featuring Two of Goddard's Faculty

Walter Butts

Two of Goddard's faculty are state poets laureate -- W.E. Butts, who teaches in the Individualized BA, is poet laureate of New Hampshire, and Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg, who teaches in the Individualized MA, is poet laureate of Kansas. Now the two will be meeting in Kansas as part of a national convergence of poets laureate Mirriam-Goldberg is organizing with other Midwestern poets laureate.

Cover photo for An Endless Skyway

The gathering March 13-14 in Lawrence, Kansas, includes readings, an auction to have dinner with a poet laureate, museum tours of the world-renowned Spencer Arts Museum with a poet laureate, and an all-day conference featuring panels on poetry as it relates to healing, the land, spirituality, publishing, making a living and the process of writing; and all-star readings."When we started organizing this, I thought maybe we'd pull in ten or so poets, and I'm blown away that we have 20 coming," Mirriam-Goldberg said. "Most are coming on their own dime because of their belief in the power of poetry, community and what can happen when we all come together."

What will happen when they all come together? "We're not completely sure, but I know the conversations will be fascinating, the poetry will be overflowing, and we'll probably do a good combination of lamenting the loss of arts funding in our states and telling stories that make us fall over laughing."

Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg

The other poets coming includi former U.S. poet laureate Ted Kooser, plus Marilyn L. Taylor (WI), Peggy Shumaker (AK), Karla Morton (TX), Walter Bargen (MO), Mary Swander (IA), Sue Brennan Walker (AL), Bruce Dethlefsen (WI), Lisa Starr (RI), Denise Low (KS), Norbert Krapf (IN), Marjory Wentworth (SC), Mary Crow (CO), David Romtvedt (WY), David Evans (SD), Jonathan Holden (KS), Joyce Brinkman (IN) and Carolyn Kreiter-Foronda (VA). This event is also the book launch for An Endless Skyway: Poetry from the State Poets Laureate of America (Ice Cube Books).

Registration rates are very reasonable (beginning at $65 for the all-day conference), and ample accommodations are available in the area. For full information, please see www.UnitedPoetsLaureate.wordpress.com.

Connecting with Self, Others & Nature: Brian Moore & Transformative Language Arts

Brian Moore, a graduate of the Transformative Language Arts concentration of the IMA, writes about how we can use the written word to connect with ourselves, our communities and the earth for Alternatives Magazine:

Within and around the earth,
Within and around the hills,
Within and around the mountains,
Your authority returns to you.
–A Tewa Pueblo Prayer

The poem above has great significance, for it is in the context of the earth, hills, and mountains—indeed, the landscapes in which we live, move, and breathe—that we express and embrace our own unique authority, connecting with those other sentient beings, human and other-than-human, with whom we share this planet.

To read more, visit the site,

Amanda : Writing, Art and Environment

Amanda Sandos, a current IMA student, is studying environment art through visual arts and creative writing to explore the deep ecology connections between animals and humans. A staff writer for Got2BeGreen, and a volunteer at the Maier Museum of Art, Amanda is a former zoo keeper with extensive experience with both animals and art. Check out her blog about life on this wild planet.

Chilean Flamingo, Lake Natron, Northern Tanzania

I stand at the edge of a flock, on the shore of this parched bowl, the base of a volcano. Ten thousand birds flag their heads from side to side, necks stretched, marching in rows.

The quills on their backs click like beads when Masai women walk, barely heard over the honking chaos. Every year when the rains come, the lake rises from cracked earth,

they wade through bubbles, mixing blue-green algae and brine shrimp. If the earth is quenched they build, scooping and stamping, stamping and scooping, clapping

their feet, molding mounds, growing thinner, feathers frayed, caked, matted. She’ll perch at the top of her turret and sing – soft, lyrical – stretching towards any who walk past,

resting her neck against the one who stops, hoping he’ll rub his neck to hers. She’ll close her eyes and return the caress of the one standing with her in this boiling lake.

The one who will share their roost, turn their chalky egg, tend their chick, preen and feed, protect until these waters recede.

This year, they waited for the sky to open, but no rains came. Tonight, as the sun sinks, they lift their wings and fly, without ritual, without young.