First Week of Frigid Februuuuuary!

Once again, it's cold and snowy and we're all trying our best to keep busy and warm.

Things accomplished this week:

* Annual Work Reports:  Two down, one more to go.

**Grading first batch of papers.  Nearly done.  Editing other people's work.  Nearly done.
NB: I have handed back papers (critical and creative) last week, but once the work cycle commences, it's constant until the end of the semester. I'm blessed to be working with a student who is working on a novella.
She is  a teacher's dream and no doubt is going to be a writer with a brilliant career.  Already, she has several publications.  And, she listens to me. I'm so proud of her.


Getting ready for a poetry reading at St. John Fisher College, February 19th, 2015, at 7:30 p.m. in Wilson Formal Lounge.
Kitty Jospe will be reading from her just-released poetry collection Golden Smoke (Foothills Publishing,2015). This reading is free and open to the public.

Poet’s Statement:

I have always been intrigued by the power of paradox to sharpen our awareness and bring us to imagine the unimaginable.   The title of this collection of poems is inspired by the plant Golden Smoke (Corydalis aurea). Its yellow blossoms also give it the epithet of Scrambled Eggs. Known for its medicinal qualities when brewed in tea for various aches and pains, it is also poisonous if ingested. The long-lived seeds may lie dormant until stimulated by such disturbance as fire.

Golden is a word attached to mathematics, myth, and perhaps what lies beyond any metaphorical smoke. The opening and closing sections of this book derive from words in the title poem:

 “Wordless charcoal” combines a fire’s destruction with creation of charcoal as medium to trace and transcribe memory of experience. “Half-cadences”, also known as “incomplete” or “cadences imparfaites”, fool us into thinking the music we hear has reached an end. The poems in the section “Scrambled” and “Color for burnt land” celebrate the power of emotion, art and imagination.

 In Praise of Golden Smoke:

“Kitty Jospé’s poems powerfully engage the world in their range and depth of observation.  The reader has the additional pleasure of wandering through museums with an eloquent docent and insightful poet at our side.  //If some poems embrace commitment to family and community, others meditate on heart-wrenching loneliness and loss.  As she writes, “Hang on/ we need to/hang    on/tight.”

She does.”  Grant Holcomb, Director Emeritus of the Memorial Art Gallery

Took my Encounters Class to Memorial Art Gallery  on Thursday, 2/5/2015.My students loved it.  

The current exhibit: 

 Infinite Place: The Ceramic Art of Wayne Higby

January 25–March 29, 2015 in the Grand Gallery

                                                Photo from Memorial Art Gallery Website

                                

is not to be missed.  It's just breath-taking.  I love how its cumulative effect shows Higby's passion and process.  




Today, February 8th, 2015  I plan on venturing out to hear the Cordancia SINGS at Christ Church at 3 p.m.
Tickets 15/Regular,  STUDENTS AND SENIORS $10.00.