It came a lot earlier than most of us expected... spring. Seems that everything is blooming and growing, not only in the plants and greenery but in us as well.
We celebrate spring with a Portland show! The first big one in too long a time. I'll be sharing the SPACE stage with Sara Cox (an acclaimed Portland songwriter and performer), and local artist, Susan Bickford, who's installing an interactive sculptural projection which turns the microcosm of a kiddie pool into a macrocosmic model of celestial bodies. Your interactions with the piece will become a part of the show.
Remember the Pink Album, a beneift for the Maine Breast Cancer Coalition? I'll be playing a Pink Album benfit at Johnathan's in Ogunquit, Maine (alongside some wonderful songwriters). Get show info and tickets HERE.
If you're wondering what I'm doing when I'm not on the road...
This winter I had the honor of being a mentor in the Telling Room's Young Writers and Leaders Program, where local writers are pared with teenaged refugee and immigrant English Language Learners as part of the program. Each week I was humbled and surprised by the students' stories of coming to the U.S. and their willingness to share them. A movie has been made with them by the talented Sonya Tomlinson and David Meiklejohn. They're raising funds to have the film shown in Boston (accompanied by the students) in addition to Portland. One of the things I love most about the Telling Room is that they always create a public platform for those stories to be heard by the community - so important.
Come see the film at SPACE in Portland on May 24th.
Watch, learn, and support HERE.
Inspired by the season, I offer a poem.
I garden by dark
While children are being sent to bed
And the sun is pulled down
As if our gravity tugs the orange orb.
When bellies are full from suppers
And twilight thins the sky,
I tend the ground.
I garden by dark
In the exhalation of day
and brail the stones amongst my fingers,
pushing dirt under my nails
The wind folding hair at my face
Into my mouth
As I bend.
Goosebumps threaten to rise
But the soil holds the warmth of day.
Firmly, I pull at unwanted invaders,
Spidery veins that spread all too fast.
I clear the earth
And my thoughts.
The quiet of the garden
and faint rushing of the highway below
backdrop the simple cognition of
soil
weed
water
seed.
Birds listen, yearning
As I turn earthworms in their beds,
too groggy and wary to leave the comfort of their roost.
I garden by night,
And my ribcage fills with joy,
Squinting at leafy shadows in the ambient glow
And marveling at what I know they will become.
Spindly seedlings set into their new beds
With an almost audible sigh of contentment
And stretch their roots in every direction
And
I
Am
At
Peace.
Photo: Sophie Dougher
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