In Vermont, we read a lot of poetry about Vermont. From Robert Frost to David Budbill to current poet laureate Sydney Lea, poets have found rich and rare material in the state’s landscape, culture and contradictions. But Vermonters — even poets — occasionally do go elsewhere. In recent collections, two writers at different stages of life tell us what they found there.... Read more

We found her beneath the old footbridge at the western crook of our farm, diary splayed over one knee, scribbling away as she watched the water. Mute and ecstatic was the way a poet might have described her. Me, I thought she looked kind of dead. Every freckled inch of her was hidden beneath a black dress, the kind I’ve heard some call “Victorian” — lots of pleats and frills and such. I’d never seen this particular one before, but God knew that costume trunk was huge.

Clem looked at me. I looked back at Clem.... Read more

You may think you know Lake Champlain — its crisp, icy-blue stillness at sunrise, and its warm orange glow against the familiar backdrop of the Adirondacks as the sun descends in the evening.

Countless artists have tried their hand at capturing our lake’s striking beauty. But what lies beneath? Daniel Lusk, a poet and senior lecturer in the University of Vermont English department, was inspired by the stories resting unseen beneath the otherwise familiar scene.... Read more

Last week Roberta Harold of Montpelier sent us what she called “a piece of doggerel” that she had written and didn’t know what to do with — until she read Kevin J. Kelley’s “WTF” article about all the crows in Burlington [February 2]. Though she was under the impression Seven Days does not publish poetry, we assured her that we do, sometimes, and that we were going to publish hers because we liked it. Here’s her explanation:... Read more

Good news for the New England Review, the award-winning 32-year-old literary journal of Middlebury College. It will receive a $10,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to support its publication and promotion in 2011.... Read more

Arok, hiding from the Arabs in the branches of a tree,
two weeks surviving on leaves,
legs numb, mouth dry.
When the mosquitoes swarmed
and the bodies settled limp as petals under the trees,
he shinnied down, scooping out a mud pit with his hands
sliding into it like a snake,
his whole body covered except his mouth.
Perhaps others were near him,
lying in gloves of mud, sucking bits of air through the swamp holes,
mosquitoes biting their lips,
but he dared not look.

What did he know of the rest of South Sudan, pockmarked with bombs, ... Read more

Come inside now.

Stand beside the warming stove.

Watch out through the windows as

a cold rain tears down

the last leaves.

The larder full of dried herbs,

hot peppers, chutneys,

jellies, jams, dill pickles,

pickled relishes,

pickled beets.

The freezer full of frozen greens —

chard and spinach, collards, kale —

green beans, basil, red sauces,

applesauce and

smoked meats.

The woodshed dry and full of wood,

winter squashes stashed away.

Down cellar: potatoes, carrots,... Read more

The gristle in this meat is killing us

with kindness, its fatness quaint

in 2008 as the days

swindle into unexpected darkness,

sharpness of knives kept in a safe.

Kindness has limits we have to obey.

The clock holds out its hands to us —

time appears to bend our way.

We watch it fly out a closed window

to the day before yesterday.

Given the chance to live again, do.

Remember that October the trees turned

redder than your ass in the shower?

I wouldn’t want to give up either.

At first, Cookie Campbell thought joining the writing workshop at the Randolph Senior Center would be a waste of time. “I came because Mary made me,” she says dryly, eliciting a smirk from her friend Mary Jacobs, who herself signed up for the memoir-writing class about two years ago to appease a nagging granddaughter. The women had no idea they would stick with it for so long, or that their work would interest anyone but their children and grandkids.... Read more

Nights when the wet road glistens like a black mirror they are there, perched like stone-still statues

on the dark sheen of tar,

contemplating the sound a drop makes

when finally it strikes something solid.

Great washes of car light bearing down

on their unblinking meditations,

they are little buddhas, squatting transfixed,

and for miles the road is splattered,

little wet piles where they have gone down under tires,

knowing in one instant the sound their lives make

when something solid finally strikes.