What I have Been Up To...
One thing I have done is finish my book, The Woman Who Named Herself, my first book of poetry, meant to honor women who have chosen a name other than their birth name, as an affirmative act of naming themselves, in a society where too often they, and I have been defined by others.
It is also about Lesbian women, but others have told me the book is about more than that. To paraphrase, one woman told me I had a way of expressing emotion that opened her eyes about what poetry could be. She said her experience in the world of journalism, academia and law had closed her in a box she had not known was there. I will not use her name as I do not yet have permission.
But I believe her comment opened my eyes too, that many experiences recounted in the book are ones that many women may relate to.
The image above appears on the cover. The book was published by Xlibris. To order, call 888-795-4274, or order on line at www.xlibris.com or www.amazon.com.
Other things that have occupied my time have been 1. serving as UU Church Board Secretary, and 2. starting up a new arts group and arts program in my church, named Chalice Arts, to promote arts expression in our church and in our community. If you are interested in following our events and activities, visit our new blog at chalicearts.blogspot.com .
I am the featured artist in a solo show in the church, Montage and Metaphor. I have around 30 images in the exhibit, interspersed with poems written about subjects related to images in the art pieces. I gave a talk about the connections between montage and writing poetry in January.
I am planning another poetry program for the Greeley Poetry Club in March, about Courting Your Muse, and will say more about accessing the right brained process in writing poetry. No doubt my efforts in researching this talk will result in an overflow in this blog, in the future.
I want to say, in the few months I have been away from this blog site, much has changed in Google's blogging program. The "Design" options are wonderful, and what you write is now what you get, when the post is published. Thank you Google. It is now a pleasure to enter comments and images! (This is in bold, on purpose!)
© Ruth Zachary.
