By Betty A. Little
posted
Aug 15, 2012
photos by Ann B. Day
The valley along Tinmouth Road off Route 140 above Wallingford
is one of the most beautiful places in Vermont. This summer, the
sky was blue, layered with white clouds, and the mountains rose one
beyond another, purple hues fading to shades of gray. The valley is
full of green fields, red barns, gray clapboard farmhouses,
machinery and occasional cows. The dirt road leads through tunnels
of trees marked by birch. Queen Anne's Lace and purple Showy
Fleabane grow thickly along the roadway. A turn left to Tinmouth
Pond, brings you to the water and cottages with canoes turned
upside down on the grass. The pavilion is here where the Green
Mountain Writers have met one week in early August for more than a
decade.
Writers come from all over to be instructed and inspired; to
struggle with writing prompts; to listen to each other's memoirs,
poetry and history; to eat delicious food; and sweat in the summer
heat, dip in the lake and talk endlessly. Few training camps offer
such dawn to dusk energizing activity.
Here Killington Arts Guild Members come to further their work
and show off their talents. This year Yvonne Daley, the conference
director talked about the importance of "place" in writing
and read from her book: A Mighty Storm: Stories of Resilience After
Irene, "We know that we are changed; we just don't know how
much."
Ann Day recited her nature poems with sound effects and
read: "I AM, cattails, the meadow, the mud, the early
blossoms of red osier, the cat tails, the red-winged blackbird, the
breeze that bends willowed grasses and the emerging spring that
buds within me."
Donna Martin's offered a piece from her history of Killington and
brought farmer Oran Bates to life; and Betty Little recited her
poem," Love is...a firewall against the chaos of the world."
On the hottest day, poet David Budbill, from the Northeast
Kingdom, read about Vermont summers, "Ninety days…just got to get
outside and get together. I said, OUTSIDE! OUTSIDE!"
Judy Gould's winter paintings of Vermont: churches, villages and
hillsides that cover pavilion walls offering a pleasant backdrop.
People asked, "What is the Killington Arts Guild?" They were
surprised at the variety of our art and the commitment we have to
our writing.
For more information about KAG activities and works visit
www.killingtonartsguild.org
Tagged:
KAG, Green Mountain Writers
