One special element of the Live Poets’ group process is its communication model. We call it “give-and-take.” Key aspects of the “give-and-take” communication model are evident in the ways in which A Quiet Wind Speaks came into being.
Consensus played a large part in this book’s formation. In our work, we have consistently valued one another’s spirit of collaboration as we discussed issues based on their merits, not on the basis of which person brought the idea to the group. During meetings, the whole group participated in every phase of the book, from defining content to choosing the cover design.
Diversity and openness to fresh influences played vital roles in building this book. Poets, who hail from many walks of life, submitted poems on a wide range of subjects. All of the members, from one founder to three newly found poets, contributed to the creation of this book. For example, our newest poet initiated and organized a reading at Rediscovered Books in which we announced the book’s title and gave a preview reading of our poems from this collection.
Democratic principles also informed our book, especially the title selection process. Every poet voted in every title election. After the selection process, which took four ballots over the course of two weeks, A Quiet Wind Speaks surfaced from a preliminary list of 55 titles.
While building this book, members freely offered their talent. Editing the manuscript with the assistance of Margaret Koger and Jamie Armstrong was a delight for me because we’ve combined our strengths and backgrounds for the good of the whole project. Margaret proceeded efficiently with the confidence of a widely published poet. Jamie, our professorial and founding member, made countless considered editorial contributions. Maggie and Jamie, along with our long-time member, Vera Noyce, carefully advised and guided individual poets at crucial times as well. Cover design was also selected by vote. The green girl-woman design you see near the final blue book cover is just one of several alternatives created by members of the group.
Vital to the building of A Quiet Wind Speaks has been the support of the people and organizations who helped our writers’ group thrive over time. We honor the memory of Bill Studebaker, who gave us the motivation and encouragement to publish our poetry. Except during the pandemic era, two organizations have offered their enduring hospitality. The Cabin has hosted our in-person meetings for more than 20 years. And, the Garden City Public Library has been our reading home for National Poetry Month for 11 years.
Finally, the Live Poets Society is grateful for the community members who have regularly attended our readings and performances. From the poets’ give-and-take process during workshop meetings and from the consistent presence of an audience at readings, we have woven the tapestry of community embodied in this book.
Booklet created by Sharla Ng and Jamie Armstrong, 2016
Dance is the first art I ever loved. Its essence is energy, the lightness of being. Poetry - the art of dancing with thoughts and words - sustains me in my middle years. When Kelli proposed a dance/poetry collaboration responding to the Boise Art Museum's origami exhibit, I felt she was on to something good. Time, like our 30-year friendship. Would tell. Kelli began enthusiastically offering many possibilities to perform and display poetry with her choreography: readings, paper print, even screen projections. Sketches of Angela Rockefeller's costumes appeared. Poets observed dance rehearsal video clips. And the poetry began to surface. When the Boise Art Museum's International collection of origami came to town, poets attended. More poems surfaced. As poets watched dance rehearsals, more poems came to light. Although not every Live Poet contributed responsive works, everyone gave feedback on early drafts and encouragement. Jamie Armstrong's measured approach and good judgement served us all. He guided our collaboration on this book. And his spontaneous back-stage yo-yo performance delighted and untied the entire dance-poetry crew out of pre-performance jitters the night we sold out at the Boise Art Museum. Finally, I knew we'd done something good when the children from Valley View Elementary folded 1000 cranes for the spring shows at the Boise Contemporary Theatre. They wished that the sick may be healed. Based on this project's history, the odds are favorable.
Not Until: An introduction It has been said that a person should do these three things in his/her lifetime – plant a tree, write a book and build a house. Without the taunt of Shakespearean palaver, I would write a poem.
A poem is really a simple thing. William Stafford was wont to say that it is a serious joke. That poetic language is ordinary language slightly heightened.
It is fancied that children write poems in school. It is a National Endowment for the Arts premise that the poets-in-the-schools programming has prepared thousands, nay tens of thousands, of students to appreciate, if not write, poetry. It has been the cause to publish many books and has helped the careers of many poets.
Every hear more “school marms” come West to teach creative writing than came West during the Gold Rush to teach the three R’s.
Still, not everyone has written a poem, and for that matter, not every poet has planted a tree or built a house. (For most of us, there are things yet to be done.) But each member of the Live Poets Society has put his/her hand at prosody and, respectively, fashioned a poem.
It is a demanding business, this “the writing of poetry,” and it takes determined folks to write it. I know a little bit about each of the poets included in this anthology, and I direct you to the biographical sketches at the end of the volume to read between the lines. You will find grandmothers, educators, spiritual leaders and self-effacing magicians.
What little I had with this anthology was encouragement. I was, however, lucky enough to have many of the poets in a workshop at the Log Cabin Literary Center. And, through that workshop, I was able to sell them on their own vision and on the minimalist’s work ethic “Do something poetic every day,” add a comma, take one out. From such efforts, books are built.
Here is a series of lines I have selected and offer, a type of poetic litz wire, to help transmit the substance of this anthology:
“far beyond the range of ordinary signals
"just beyond the reach of words”
“… on the axes of the human eye”
“what is watched is watched”
“… the viscosity of drying blood”
“Man and animal look at each other.
The hunter looks into history
sees his own heart
opens the cage”
“… we started to believe
our constant verbal vigilance”
“Thoreau died
and the world slogs onward”
. . .
Were I to title this strand of poetry, which I have braided together as an abridgment of this anthology, I’d call it “The Day the Fish Danced By,” but that’s been used by one of the anthologized poets to a better end.
I am simply pleased to have been asked to ask you to and to seek out the poets who are the Live Poets Society, an appreciable double entendre. May they never recant.
William Studebaker
Twin Falls Idaho