SEPTEMBER 18—2024

Right after the event on Sunday the 15th, my lights came on in my car that said the airbags weren’t working. I leave for Rochester, NY for a 6 hour drive on the weekend to accept my Outstanding Alumni Award from Nazareth University, a great honor I would like to arrive at and return from safe and sound. So for the last 3 days- my life has been at the dealership and everything else has been on the back burner. You don’t realize how important our cars are until you don’t have one and you wait all day for someone to call to say the part is in!. Today, three days later, is the first day i’ve had to put my thoughts down on Sundays wonderful event. It was THE BEST ever thanks to great art and great poets.

It truly makes me certain that combining my talents as an active artist with that of an active poet is the right one. I love creating art, it’s just something inside my that responds to creating an image and seeing it evolve into a work of art. Color, texture, paint and canvas, tint and tone combine in more unexpected than expected ways with abstraction. I love when a viewer sees something even more in the art than I do. The act of painting in the process towards a finished piece is part of the adventure of discovery. Along the way, three or four poems might develop, but it’s not until the finished piece is done that I visit it in a visceral way and begin to write. I have 3 “Solo” shows already planned and more in the works for 2025. I became the Inaugural Poet Laureate for the town of Madison a week or so ago. I wonder where it’s all going sometimes, but I do know one thing. Where this artist goes, the poet goes. That is my first and foremost dedication and passion. Taking others along with me, by teaching, supporting, hosting and creating events both in art and in poetry will remain part of a professional and civic duty. Once an educator, always an educator I’m realizing. As I get older, it is a wonderful opportunity if not joyous part of giving back as part of my legacy.

THE WEEKEND WAS AMAZING, SAW SO MANY COLLEGE MATES, PICTURED HERE WITH PRESIDENT OF NAZARETH, BETH PAUL, RON NETSKY, BELOW AS WELL AS MANY STUDENTS AND FACULTY THAT WORK WITHIN OUR SCHOLARSHIPS, OTHER ALUMNI AWARD WINNERS AND SOME YEARBOOK PHOTOS THAT REMIND ME OF HOW OUTSTANDING A JOURNEY I HAVE BEEN ON THANKS TO ALL WHO HAVE HELPED GUIDE ME.

The Poetry of Art : The Art of Poetry -Held on the Sunday the 15th of September was possibly one of the most successful events i’ve had this year. By combining my two loves of art and poetry, especially the way Ekphrastic poetry does, I believe that growing my idea as and artist and poet myself, was indeed the right fit at the right time. The world needs creativity, optimism, authentic voices with imagination and enthusiasm and live shared community events like never before. We are all way tapped into our cell phones where maybe we dove into during covid but we retreated back to our lonesome caves, still, we can spend hours on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube and all sorts of other social media spending our hours entertained yet completely alone and without any other human interaction.

We traded entertainment for interaction, followers for feelings I think, at least the feelings that we sense deeply in our hearts when we look at art or hear a poem. Certainly art can entertain and inspire us and poetry can entertain and inspire us. So what alchemy occurs when both are mixed? I wondered this myself. Earlier this year I began the Ekphrastic Poetry Trust as a way to gather poets that were both versed in ekphrastic poetry as well poets that had a creative voice that I thought needed to be elevated a bit more beyond the level of smaller poetry oriented groups reading to each other. I also started teaching ekphrastic poetry to anyone that might be interested as well as to creative writers that wanted to hone their skills. I started this originally at the Guilford Community Center, then moved the class offering to the E.C. Scranton Madison Library.

The groups are small but intensely powerful. There are times I have only one or two people attend and it’s wonderful because we learn so much from each other. I am amazed what words were lurking in people from the community that had never written before. Slowly, two people turned into five, then twelve, then fifteen and so on. At 6 months old I now have over 50 poets who I offer “free membership” to the trust or the EPT of CT as I say. I felt the group is part of my civic duty to give back to my community, so never charging for a membership is what I offer for just being on the roster to call upon when I have an event and I have never been disappointed. Some poets come from 50 or more miles away, like Norwalk or Westchester or Woodstock and might drive 2 or more hours to participate!

For this event which was held at the Guilford Art Center, two days after the Guilford Art Leagues 75th Annual Show Opening, I hosted poets and attendees with a full reception with wine and refreshments, sandwiches and snacks as well as a grand prize (an original work of art valued at $850.00) first prize of $100.00, second prize at $50.00 and a third prize at $25.00. plus 5 honorable mentions. ( due to a hair of margin that I just count call, I ended up selecting 3- third prize winners at 25.00 each! )

I brought in my microphone from my open mic events, posted ALL 33 of the poems submitted and we were off! Over 50 people attended the event and it was a huge success for poets and audience. THE POEMS AND POETS WERE FANTASTIC.

William Moorehead, Sue Wolf, Debra Howard, ME, Larry Jabbonsky, Pat Hale

Tony Fusco, Sherri Bedingfield, Lauren Murphy, Jane Jacobson, Shawn VB

all these amazing poets read original works to an audience of 54 attendees at the event

Sheila Kaczmarek, president of the Guilford Art League, Ed Lent, inaugural Poet Laureate of Madison and Alexa MacCrady, artist and Juror for the 75th Annual Show at the Guilford Art Center.