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Art work, writing or music not to be reproduced without the artist’s, writer’s or composer’s permission.
Visual Gallery
Scroll in the orange box to view more artwork, click a photo to enlarge and view as slideshow.

David Klein: Charlize

David Klein: Spring

David Klein: You Can Always Talk About the Weather

Nancy Gore: Winter Wind (magnet)

Nancy Gore: Exodus (magnet)

Nancy Gore: Recollection is a Holy Act (magnet)

Francine Levine: Hooked rug/pillow

Francine Levine: Hooked rug/pillow

Francine Levine: Detail of Hooked Dragonfly Rug

Susan Sandman: Butterflies 2, paper sculpture (3/16/21)

Susan Sandman: Butterflies 3, paper sculpture (3/18/21)

Susan Sandman: Butterflies 4: Waterfall, paper sculpture (3/31/21)

Orah Moore: March 21, 2021

Orah Moore: March 27, 2021

Orah Moore: March 28, 2021

Deb Dwyer: Little Town

Deb Dwyer: Tulips for Ellen

Deb Dwyer: Thinning Ice, Wrightsville

Linn Bower: A Boquet For You

Linn Bower: The Sweet Season

Linn Bower: The Freedom Fighter

Janet Van Fleet: Hugging a Fish; steel, wood, rubber; 56x18x5″

Janet Van Fleet: Ship; wood, goatskin, antique shoe last, bones; 45x27x16″

Janet Van Fleet: Code; code practice case, wood, bottle caps, stone; 56x16x6″

Pamela Walker: North Branch of Winooski at the NB Nature Center

Pamela Walker: Poppies in sunlight

Pamela Walker: A monarch thriving

Deb Sigel: Spring Shower: Ink & Watercolor

Deb Sigel: Along the Garden Walk: Ink & watercolor

Deb Sigel: Planetary Body: Ink & Watercolor

Annie Wattles: Watercolor flock

Annie Wattles: Applause for all

Susan Winslow: On second thought . . .

Susan Winslow: Off the edge

Susan Winslow: “Do one thing every day that scares you.” Eleanor Roosevelt

Loring Starr: My chapbook of trees and tree poems, “She that plants trees loves others besides herself.”

Loring Starr: Two-page spread from my second chapbook, of birds and bird poems, “An Exaltation of Larks”.

Loring Starr: Another two-page spread from my second chapbook, of birds and bird poems, “An Exaltation of Larks”. This has been such a rewarding project!

Rachel Walker Cogbill: Workhorses

Rachel Walker Cogbill: Bloodroot

Rachel Walker Cogbill: Spring Beauties

Georgia Landau: A new friend speeds the voyagers on their way.

Georgia Landau: Almost there! The dragon offers them a ride.

Georgia Landau: Mermaids play, as the Lady and the Seahorse watch the Voyagers pass.

Nicola Morris

Nicola Morris

Nicola Morris

Julia Chafets: Face by Julia

Julia Chafets: Landscape by Rubin

Julia Chafets: Flower by Will

Amy Ehrlich

Amy Ehrlich

Amy Ehrlich

Deborah Jean Armstrong: Altered book with dream title scrolls….

Deborah Jean Armstrong: Floating above -dream collage…

Deborah Jean Armstrong: Dreamweb…

Yona Shahar: We’re all spots on the same cow

Yona Shahar: The long & winding road

Yona Shahar: Ringo on Colbert

Laura Ruth: Seventh Day: Rest. Under the veil.

Laura Ruth: Light becomes water; land turns to stone

Laura Ruth: Watching the Brook: Days of Water Study (pen and ink)

Lucie Hobbs-Johnson

Lucie Hobbs-Johnson

Lucie Hobbs-Johnson
Writing Gallery
View the slides by clicking on the arrows. Jump to an author’s writing by clicking their name below. Be sure to scroll down on longer slides.
Angela Grace Another tale about my dad and me but this one is entirely fictional. Enjoy. March 30th My Dad and I Go Swimming My dad and I stand at the edge of the ten story cliff staring down at the very distant water trying to judge the quickly retreating ocean waves. We must time our dangerous leap so we will hit the waves just at their depth which means we have to leap when the waves have receded and there is nothing to see but sand. Too soon, too late, too bad. Of course it is not ten stories up but it sure looks like it. I am wearing my new pale blue two piece ruffled swim suit which barely hangs on my skinny body even though I am fifteen. The top has a strap from the middle, ties around my neck and the rest just hangs down not supported by any bosoms. The bottom has lace ruffles and they add some bulk to my nonexistent butt. My dad asks if I really want to do this? I don't answer. He takes my shaking hand, starts counting and we fly. Our toes have skidded off the sandy edge of the cliff as if to say “last chance to stop” but it's too late for a warning. The wind from our fast descent flutters the lace on my bathing suit and I feel the invisible strength of the air. My breath has traveled into my throat and it gets stuck there and I cannot even scream although I hear it in my ears. I see my surroundings flashing by, and my life too. My dad is all smiles and shouts of glee. I think I am going to die. As we hit the icy, frothy water with toes first we find my dad has timed it perfectly. We have not broken our bodies on the concrete looking sand but have remarkably made it to our dubious goal, alive. Now it gets serious. I thought the air had power! Even though we pointed our toes so we could knife through the water as we touched down, it still came hard and fast. My dad and I managed to keep our hands held fast, but my free hand was flailing about and my dad's hand was placed over his crouch to protect himself. Up our legs the water went and forcefully pulled (pushed?) our suits into our butt cracks never to be removed. My frilly top, not held down by anything, began choking me. The salty water was chucked up my nose and mouth so far I could smell and taste it all at the same time. I think my brain is preserved in salt forever. It felt like my hair was being pulled out by the roots. My dad was having the same experience. The best part was yet to come, despite the sudden attack on our bodies. As we smashed into the liquid cement and became submerged, a whole hidden world engulfed my dad and me. The turbulent water was just as violent as at the surface, swishing and shaking us but our bodies adjusted to the movement and we felt back in the liquid we came from. There is a different kind of quiet under the water. We could hear fish swimming, flora growing and sense large objects around us. But we did not hear it with our ears but knew it in our bones. We felt we could breathe if we needed to so there was no panicky, gasping effort to quell our automatic trigger to draw in air. The feeling was not so much physical but other worldly. We didn't struggle to surface but let ourselves drift down until the power of the jump ebbed and we stopped still. Before we began floating upward again, there was the point of solid quiet and stillness and at that moment we felt eternally close to one another, still holding hands. The moment lasted forever. We surfaced, greeted by the brilliant sun, calm and present. The water had once again become a part of us to connect us forever. We swam lazily to the edge of the horizon and looked over at eternity.
My Dad
My buff brother, Guy, and me
Caroline Tavelli-Abar March 20th. 2021 Digital Drawing Red Horizon. See the line between heavens? She calls all sunsets home![]()
Caroline Tavelli-Abar March 10th. 2021 Crossroads At the first ring I Answered the old fashion phone Now each night I sit at this place between yesterday and today, in hand modern device refreshing the page at the crossroads of many Imagination Feverishly type at the first sign of the prompt tomorrow’s missives It’s with sheer delight this crossing comes to be my most energized act![]()
Caroline Tavelli-Abar March 19th. 2021 Migration Today I heard them loud and clear across melting Snow. Their echo long In the distance calls: We are back, we are back, spring Is around the bend. Their flight spans miles in orderly formation they travel, reminding us of strength in team work, and safety in numbers, defiant and free they find familiar nesting ponds; hope carried on fiercely open wings.![]()
Axie Noyes Nodal Points The other night I lit a re out under the stars and watched the half moon sail across the southern sky. It seems like I might have received a transmission of sorts. Been pondering the meaning of time and function of memory and the work and lives of ancestors and my own mission here this time around. I wondered about distance, and how if everything was together at the start - the bang - how is it that some parts are so far away now? Are we like sail boats in a race where some catch a better wind? A land breeze along a shore? Does more mass equate to greater speed once things get rolling? And then too, how do we really know if the universe is expanding? Couldn’t we be shrinking, like Alice at the bottom of the rabbit hole, nearly drowning in her own tears? I remember long and intense hide-and-go-seek games, how when the one who was “it” would hide their eyes, leaning into the old tree, and start counting. The rest of us would take off at full speed in opposite directions, to nd good, and distant hiding places. I wonder, is that something like what the universe is up to? If so, what happens when it hears the call, “ally-ally-outs-in-free?" I remember sitting in class at Potomac school, 4th grade I think, on a snowy afternoon. Mrs. Ruprect was reading the opening chapter of Once and Future King. Mrs. Ruprect was ancient. She had taught my father. I had my head on the desk by the window overlooking a treed courtyard. But from the angle of my gaze, for that moment there was no ground visible. There was no ground covered with glisten, only the silent falling and the drone of her distant voice. I recall thinking it odd the flakes distinct and close-by appeared darker then the further white hypnotic hum of white. There was a sense of a convergence, and then a shift in reality. Simply put, I was no longer still, though I had not actually moved. I was no longer the observer of movement, but the movement itself. Me, the room, with all of its’ previous weight. We were now rising. I could feel it. The same subtle downward pressure on my body as in an elevator, "going up!" All ascending: chalk boards, desks, classmates, cinder block walls, black linoleum oors with their faint wisps of cloud patterns, Mrs. Ruprect, T.H White's bones, and Arthur and Merlin as sh in the mote, all rising into the pure haze of undifferentiated light. We are like stars. They say we are star dust, and rarely what we appear to be. We seem to be solid, but are told we are made up of tiny particles with worlds of space between them - basically we’re clouds. Here on Earth things appear still with moon and stars moving around us, when now we know we’re spinning and circling the sun and the suns spinning and rocketing through space. it’s all moving - all dancing. There is little true stillness to be found. Like ballet dancers some learn to nd a focal point and as they spin they keep their balance by turning our their eyes and heads again and again to that place of apparent stillness. Or some, like twirling dervishes, simply spin and spin, and let the blur of that movement become the constant point. We can appear and glimmer and speak through space and time with our gadgets after we’re long gone. We’ve been at it for centuries. In ocher and soot on cave walls. Or like this, using little black marks on empty pages, that could well speak to great great grandchildren and strangers alike in new worlds beyond. There is, at this moment, primordial light whose source has long since gone dark, entering my window. It’s traveled for eons, and its' wavy-gravy protons can still charge the retinal nets in my eyes. And too, there’s light newborn and strong, without a clue headed my way. There’re nations of stars playing crack the whip out there. They appear in our massive lenses and huge unblinking mirrors - smudged wisps. Then there are the small, dark ones of stone and ice who wander like step children in the wide ranging dim until they spark like a thrown match, struck against the inty air of Earth. Our probing gadgets have even made it possible to peer into the dark shifting clouds of the Celestial Mothers as they give birth to light itself! How is this possible? Surely there is at least one sacred space that wants no intrusion. We look to the stars and see rams, baskets, bears, chairs, chariots, serpents and twins. There’re the seven sisters dimly huddled and whispering, and belted warriors with undrawn swords. We see these things while making sense of light and telling stories. It’s what minds do. It’s natural for us. But those who travel by night and long for freedom and a dwelling place, where asylum can be found, we search out the Dipper, the Bear or Plow. The same patterned cluster pictured differently. They point out a place of apparent stillness, the unmoving center of our local spin - for those, who without a compass, need to nd their way home.
Axie Noyes The Robins Were Singing The Robins were singing from their aerial stations in the grey and full dawn Their songs reached like shadows from salty fringe As watch-fires of old to ridge and ridge and rocky ledge Round chilly peaks yet too cold, with snowy noses To resting hills on their sides, dreaming green into life A rising wave of piping came to move this world awake And cracked the shell of winter’s ear and welcomed things brand new And something long, long, so long Passed by Axie Noyes 3/28/21
R.D. Eno PHOTO BOMB In the photograph it is sunset in the late autumn of ‘45, Berlin, on the edge on what remains of Königsplatz. My father stands in his army greatcoat and garrison cap in the burnt-out wasteland of the Tiergarten, a few scorched trees clawing at the air, the carcass of the Reichstag getting scavanged. The war has roared past; my father’s there to help pick up the pieces of the Jews. He squints into the camera as if trying to glimpse me, not a year old, on the other side. But also in the shot, behind a concrete wall, I see a young girl crouching down, her blonde hair spilling from a black beret, who, at the moment of the shutter’s click, lifts her head from hiding and smiles, as if the camera and me beyond were looking just for her, a secret that my father shouldn’t know.
R.D. Eno IN MEMORY OF DAVID CARPENTER Fiddlers, lay your bows aside; David Carpenter has died. let the music hold its breath a moment to observe his death. All the old northland tunes were there, from Portsmouth to Trois Rivieres, Champlain to Isle of Shoals, in the archive of his soul. All the dances ever called in Grange, gymnasium or Town Hall, kitchen junket, church or street David knew by heart and feet. “Old-fashioned” had no devotee more staunch or exigent than he; his style, transparent to the ear, opened the door on yesteryear. He dealt his music unadorned; as he’d received, he passed it on. And in the garden and the barn as he fiddled, so he farmed. Spurn the distractions of the new; strip the synthetic from the true. In the clear, authentic mind catch the tune of humankind. Who will keep faith with the past now that David’s breathed his last? Who will pay the honor due to memories we never knew? Who upbraid when we distress simple beauty with excess? Who enjoin us to embrace time’s unmediated grace?
R.D. Eno THE CHILDREN In the evening dusk, the children emerge like ghosts from shallow graves. They shiver as they set foot to the water’s edge, brave and hopeless as heroes in a battle already lost. Continents behind them heave with the cannibal frenzy of a shark’s womb; ahead loom the gridded step-lands or the bloated piles of homo humanitas in its latest swoon. Alone, for love abandoned, they dare the rifts in the world, having no choice but pluck, no choice but to inhabit life, to step out on the high-wire of untested luck. Listen. You can hear the prayers they dare not utter. It is evening, and the children are crossing the water.
Margaret Blanchard![]()
Kelpie First time we met, tiny you dashed away from your littermates to follow a scent beyond the fence you wiggled through. “That’s the one for me,” I said with a smile I would learn to regret as I dashed behind you escaping through every opening to follow your remarkable nose through endless explorations. If it hadn’t been for adopted Hotay who corralled your boundless energy with playful nips and tumbles, I might have despaired. Instead we three enjoyed so many hikes, our daily walks, explorations along streams, up mountains, discovering trash and stench redolent of sources evident or illusory to my dense nostrils, only imagined by my scent-starved brain. Fifteen years later, we still take our daily walks, both much slower now, still pausing for mysterious odors, or thoughtfully following the seasons around our established trail, the leash a bond of love draped loosely between us. Your valor touches me deeply, a zest for life as resolute as ever despite your weakness, weariness, wobbliness: your loyalty, curiosity a map for my own aging. Oh faithful friend and guide, companion in both fat and lean times, show me the way to meaningful passage, one step at a time, savoring every sniff.![]()
Margaret Blanchard![]()
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A Vermont Traveler Reflects on NYC Thesis: Difference Exposed At a busy edge of Central Park on a lovely summer day picnickers abound: a family circle on a blanket, all of them, children and adults, totally naked. Crossing nearby on the sidewalk a Muslim family modestly attired. An earnest five year old covers her little sister’s eyes with detached forbearance as they pass the nudists. Antithesis: Poverty Articulated for Change As we hike downtown, the chorus of appeals escalates: an aging outstretched hand, with sign lamenting her own poverty; a young man’s plea: “Give me money so I don’t have to steal”; a chronically broken wheelchair for the man with no feet; and finally this scrawl from a young woman: “Give me your f**king change!”* I’m turned off by her rage; my friend admires her spunk. He gives her some change. Synthesis: Around the Rounds In the center of the Park at the hub of the Village children play in the round fountain surrounded by music from every angle, klezmer to the right, hip-hop to the left, opera to the north, jazz to the south, syncopated by voices speaking Greek, French, Mandarin, Swahili, Spanish, Creole, from people wearing cloaks, scarves, burkas, wellies, sneakers, and sandals, with treats from burritos to biryani to bagels, protesters with their conflicting signs mixing with U.N. reps, circus performers, protestors, artists, beggars, and Wall Street execs.
Margaret BlanchardHorizons and Reflections Farewell Song The ship has sailed; now you are gone. You travel alone this final time. On this sad shore here we stand, wondering, wondering where you’ve gone. You never left us here before. We always followed, tagged along across deep oceans tossing waves, through the lands of many flags. When we were small, we held your hand, or skipped behind your steady gait. For years you led through deserts and cities, laughter and tears, again, again. Now it is our time to wait with our doubts, with our blindness, mapping our own routes to faith, trusting your legacy of kindness. We knew you had to go before us. We knew it took your deepest courage. Yet still we long for one more glimpse of your sweet face, your radiant grace. At earth’s blue edge all ships vanish, no journey’s span or outcome known. We can only guess who’ll meet us, can only hope for joyous greetings. Blessed, blessed be your voyage as we grieve your tender passage. sorting through what gifts you’ve left us, memories, mysteries, one life’s lessons. The ship has sailed; now she is gone. She travels alone this final time.
Annie Wattles River of words Almost all the day windows and doors were flown wide open sun streaming in everywhere lifting the old and shining all the rooms with light and warmth and air so we changed things around took out all the blankets and pillows and a rug to the porch hung things up out there over chairs and table to air out from this time of isolation and quarantine with no others in the house us just us getting closer and closer knowing ourselves and each other in new ways that hadn’t seeped thru even after 30 plus years when there were always things to do and distractions remembering when last summer started we were new to this now the knowing of this time will live in us forever informing these new selves the ones that have come forward knowing less and knowing more
Ruth Witte Drops of watercolor and waterAbove, I started with a yellow wash and drops of color on the still-wet paint in the middle of the page to allow the colors to whoosh where they would. Paint drops around the page after it had dried were nudged with the brush to create smaller flowers. The tiny leaves? Brush pens!! In the second painting, after painting the background and a few starter flowers I outlined the vase with water and a face appeared in the swirls! You can still see the remnants.
Ruth Witte Day # 23 Mostly Monochromatic, part 2Notes on my process:
- I needed to test and experiment with acrylic markers.
- I did not like where this was going and have been wanting to do a monochromatic piece. I can use this, but I really like that one multi-colored shape and decided to leave it.
- I’ve been feeling a bit scrambled these past few days and my intentions of doing more with lines and mixing paint became entwined and confused with the desire to try these markers.
- I felt like I had a regression to my 10-year-old self, starting to overthink my work and losing confidence (Day #22)
- I took myself back to my 3 or 4-year-old self: Curiosity (what happens if I do this?) vs Expectation (this is not what I am trying to do).


Ruth Witte Day # 29 Tissue paper gone awryI've been wanting for weeks to try salt and water splatter on runny tissue paper to see if they would respond as with watercolor. Sadly, I used too much water and not enough glue for the tissue to adhere to the paper after it dried. I did try salt while it was still wet but the glue that was mixed in seems to have repelled the salt. The blue and purple stain left by the tissue dye served as the basis for more liquid watercolor and salt, highlighted by brush pens and finished with a black acrylic marker.
Michiko Oishi Haiku 春雨や木の芽草の芽喜ばせ harusameya kinomekusanome yorokobase spring rain tree buds, grass sprouts all rejoicing
Michiko Oishi Tanka 人生の返し縫なり思い出を語り合いつつ語り継ぐ時 jinseino kaeshinuinari omoideo katariaitsutsu kataritsugutoki reverse stitches of one’s life sharing memories to pass down life stories
Michiko Oishi Haiku 鳥帰る一枝ごとに新たな巣 torikaeru hitoedagotoni aratanasu birds return twig by twig new nests
Lynn A. Wild Some of you have heard of the St Paul Street Tree Project Pilot begun by the Montpelier Tree Board and Parks Department 5 years ago this year. Its purpose? To see what it takes 1) to create an edible landscape on a city street for the residents; 2) to rebuild ecosystem services lost with the death of more than 10 large maple trees over the past decade; 3) to greatly increase the street's biodiversity. Neighbors met, graciously hosted by the Lighthouse Christian Church; we ate food together, looked at pictures of trees, talked about possibilities; we signed up those willing to care for a new tree in their yards. Tree Board Volunteers marked planting sites in yards, called Dig Safe, dug 22 holes, brought compost, buckets of water, and lifted/dug/coerced 14 well-established "sapling" trees out of the tree nursery at the North Branch Nature Center; eight other trees were donated. Over 3 days, 22 fruit, nut, and berry trees and shrubs were planted in April and May of 2016, along St Paul Street. The trees have grown, flowered, produced pears, plums, and nuts, and increased the beauty of the street. Sadly, we lost one tree, the beautiful and prolifically productive Mount Royal Plum. Although I set out to write about elderberries and their role with wild blackberries in providing food and habitat for the Indigo Bunting, it's the impact on St. Paul Street of all the trees and companion plants together that created the real poetry. So here you have Envision. View as Document
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Lynn A. Wild View as Document![]()
Lynn A. Wild View as Document![]()
This is a wonderful project and beautiful art work. I am wondering if you are doing another one as I would like to contribute. I sponsored Orah Moore but I believe I could get people to sponsor me if you have another fund raiser with art contributions.