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Join us on Saturday, July 21, 2:00pm at the Tranquilbuzz Coffee House (112 W Yankie St.) for Just Words! Elise Stuart and Lisa Fields will reading from their work.

 

When Elise Stuart moved to New Mexico in 2005, her heart quietly opened to the desert. She found beauty in the river, the rocks, and in the way small, yellow flowers grow in arroyos. Her writing was revived, changed, from living not far from the Gila, in the southwest corner of the state.

She was named Poet Laureate of Silver City, NM in 2014-2017 and gave over one hundred poetry workshops to young people in Grant County schools. Students designed poem flags, expressing their own work, and the flags were hung in coffee shops, libraries and in old folks’ homes.

In the spring of 2017 her first collection of poems was published, Another Door Calls, which tells of her intimate relationship with the natural worldIn the summer she wrote about the most arduous and meaningful relationship of her life, and published My Mother and I, We Talk Cat. She continues to write poetry and short stories, while waiting for rain.

 

This excerpt is from her poem “Beyond:”Elise Stuart

The world is suddenly

alive with understanding.

Every action, sacred.

The veil lifts.

I see beyond . . .

The ordinary is meaningful.

Other worlds breathe.

Now I know there is more than this tired old place of birth and death.

Hear the secret whispered to me,

I nod my head. Yes, yes.

 

Lisa Fields lives in Southwestern New Mexico. Writing poetry expresses her desire to be immersed in a state of balance. Her inspiration comes from the joy of wild places and the challenge to live happily in the domesticated world. She is a contract writer for Quirine Ketterings, Professor of Nutrient Management in Agricultural Systems, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. In her home state of NY, Lisa served the farming community as an Extension educator for 10 years, and then worked for 10 years as a self-employed advisor.

 

Here is her poem “Desert Brides:”

Dressed in creamy lace

high desert matriarchs

stand tall and proud

their sharp leaves warn the browsing deer,

“Don’t touch my skirt, you’ll cut your tongue!”

then flicker gentle shadows in the breeze

a gift of shade for smaller creatures.

Morphed from phallic stalks,

floral bodices gracefully sway.

Some will dip too low in their dance and break,

scattering satin petals.

 

There will be an open mic after the reading.

Disclaimer:
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Southwest Word Fiesta™ or its steering committee.

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We respectfully acknowledge that the entirety of southwestern New Mexico is the traditional territory, since time immemorial, of the Chis-Nde, also known as the people of the Chiricahua Apache Nation. The Chiricahua Apache Nation is recognized as a sovereign Native Nation by the United States in the Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Friendship of 1 July 1852 (10 Stat. 979) (Treaty of Santa Fe ratified 23 March 1853 and proclaimed by President Franklin Pierce 25 March 1853).

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Mimbres Press of Western New Mexico University is a traditional academic press that welcomes agented and unagented submissions in the following genres: literary fiction, creative non-fiction, essays, memoir, poetry, children’s books, historical fiction, and academic books. We are particularly interested in academic work and commercial work with a strong social message, including but not limited to works of history, reportage, biography, anthropology, culture, human rights, and the natural world. We will also consider selective works of national and global significance.