A resident of England
since 1971, where she maintains a homeopathic practice and serves as guardian
of a local labyrinth and Sacred Circle, Connecticut native Kaaren Whitney
returns to Stamford Monday night, October 14. as featured poet at Barnes & Noble’s
Open Mic.
Besides contributing work to Painting to Poem (2006), A Book of Graces (2009) and numerous anthologies,
Kaaren has read at the Halesworth Fringe Festival and open mic events around the world. A commended winner of the Fakenham Poetry Competition
in 2008, Karen maintains an active online presence in the UK,
including a blog for Poetry Aloud and frequent contributions to the webzine Ink, Sweat and Tears. Kaaren is also
a member of the Suffolk Poetry Society.
While much of her writing is known for its focus on nature (see past postings here and
here),the full continuum
of her work and activities as poet, healer/health freedom activist (see her
Facebook link in support of
vilified vaccine researcher Andrew Wakefield) and metaphoric observer show
that no matter how much we might let ourselves be lulled by the abundant wares and ways of mass industrial production, the transition from mere existence to true thriving depends on embracing
the link between our experience as individual human beings and the living
environment in which humanity evolved.
In its multi-layered meditation of a man atop a
ladder restoring the thatch roof of a simple dwelling and the Gaia-centric purpose
to which he would put it, Kaaren’s 2011 poem “Balance” builds on the
anthropologically-themed “And They Made Tools” (see below), a 2009 ekphrastic
piece derived from a John Tuckett cyanotype (see above, left), toward a firm advocacy for a more
compassionate proportion in future between what we can do for--as opposed to to--one another and the planet:
And They Made Tools
simple at first, a stick, a sharpened
bone,
extensions of coarse fingers, rough ragged
from grubbing soil to get at starch tubers,
roots for the blood clan's sustenance, once mashed,
stone pounding fibre into flat pulp,
sweeter, easier to eat.
Walking the land, they learned by feel
its skin,
discovered food from the earth-speak terrain.
They found river pebbles, half cracked, thonged them
stick fashion, granting more accurate aim.
Flaked flints, 'slicers', scraped clean small mammal hides,
destined to become medicine bags, clan
clothing for these nomadic gatherers
who captured prey in nettle woven nets,
traps sprung from tree limbs, from stick covered holes.
Survival their goal,
uniformity
a surety, but new ways of doing,
living, becoming tool makers took hold.
They walked the land upright.
They lived in community.
They made tools.
And they survived.
Kaaren Whitney, 2009
Though the rebel do-it-yourself movement
typified by the advent of 3D printing technology looks to recharge consumerism
with a more personalized form of mass production, it is the current convention
of hit marathon-length “slow TV” programming in Norway that makes for a better
example of Kaaren’s themes in action.
NRK broadcasting’s counter-intuitive utilization of video—the medium that’s done more to foment a culture of distraction
and creative impatience than anything else in the last 70 years—is reacquainting
stressed contemporary viewers with the frantic-less pace and dedication associated
with traditionally absorbing pursuits, like knitting, fishing, fire stoking and even rail
travel, all presented in real-time detail, much like the field-to-kitchen table experience evoked by
Kaaren’s “Berries This Year”.
Keep up with Kaaren and
her work on Facebook here.
Hosted by Frank Chambers and PoemAlley's Nick Miele, the Barnes &
Noble's Open Mic Poetry program meets the second Monday of each month in the
cookbook section on the main floor of the bookstore (located in the Stamford
Down Center), beginning at 7:15 p.m.
For more information, contact:
Barnes & Noble
100 Greyrock Place Suite H009
Stamford, CT 06901
________
Additional Information:
The Case for Working with Your Hands, Or, Why Office Work Is Bad for Us and Fixing Things Feels Good
Matthew B. Crawford
Penguin Viking, 2011
Mark Frauenfelder
Portfolio,
2012
Carl Honore
HarperOne, 2005
The Global Heart Awakens: Humanity's Rite of Passage from the Love of Power to the Power of Love
Anodea Judith
Shift Books, 2013
The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community
David C. Korten
Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2006
Toolmaker Koan (novel)
John C McLoughlin
Baen, 1987
The Craftsman
Richard Sennett
Yale University Press, 2009
While part of the fun is being surprised by which
poet recites whose work and why, Guilford Poets Guild member Evelyn Atreya leaves a clue to some of her own inspiration through participation in an 83rd birthday celebration of Hamden native and National Medal of Art winner Donald Hall (The Back Chamber, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011), where she read in homage, “Meeting Professor Hall” at the Thornton Wilder Hall of Miller Library in 2011. Find out more here. 
As tonight’s moderator and pi-New Haven
Co-Director (who sometimes feels he was brought up by bears), Mark McGuire-Schwartz sees poetry as a channel for sharing warmth
and humor--and with close to thirty years’ rich experience working in state
government to mine for his own inspiration, Mark has placed material in Caduceus, Fairfield
Review, Connecticut
River Review and the Connecticut Law Journal, among other publications, as well as in the collection Loss and Laughs, Love and Fauna
(CreateSpace, 2013). His newest book is 289,
a book of 17s.
For more information, contact The pi-New Haven at:
