On Saturday morning after Carly tried (and loved!) her first taste of New Hampshire maple syrup, we headed to the Bookstock literary festival.. Woodstock is about a thirty minute drive and it was so exciting to see New Hampshire and Vermont through Carly's eyes. The mountains, lakes, New Hampshire-Vermont border and small Vermont towns were all highlights.
Once arriving in Woodstock, we found convenient parking in the small, colonial town. The weather was beautiful and the plants and flowers in full bloom. We were armed with our schedule and as challenging as it was deciding what to attend, we selected four presentations throughout the day that sounded promising. The first, by author Joan Wickersham, was a wonderful start. Wickersham is the author of the 2012 book of short stories, The News From Spain, which was recently awarded the title of best Book of the Year by NPR. She read an excerpt and discussed her vision of the short stories focusing on unexpressable forms of emotion and love.
After the first presentation, lunch, and some lengthy browsing of a used book sale (in which I purchased 15 books for $17!), we headed to a reading by Galway Kinnell.
This may have been one of the most memorable moments of the day. I read Galway Kinnell while taking Contemporary American Poetry through the School of English at St. Andrews this past spring. I focused on Kinnell and his poem, 'Vapor Trail Reflected in the Frog Pond' in one of my essays for the course. I think sitting in the St. Andrews library one day I learned that he lived in Vermont but upon seeing his birth year of 1927 and assuming the anthology I was using was old enough not to have included his (presumably recent)year of death, I believed him to be deceased. I was wrong. He is alive and pictured above. When I read that he would be present at Bookstock, I think it sold me to attend. Carly and I arrived to his reading in a hot children's religious education classroom and like most of Bookstock, we were the youngest participants there. By several decades. The room was full and we were encouraged to sit in the aisle. The experience of sitting on an oriental rug in a small Vermont town listening to Kinnell read his poetry took me back to reading and analyzing it in Scotland and never imagining that I would experience something like this. Kinnell read most of his recent work and I'll briefly mention that neither Carly or I were too crazy about it, but it was incredible to see how devoted he was to his work. Towards the end he read another favorite of mine (one of his classics) from my anthology which I was able to follow along with.
Later, Carly and I found a small general store and picked up bottles of blueberry sodas from Maine. From there, we found the Woodstock historical society where we attended a presentation on Vermont's influence in the Civil War. The presenter was Vermont's leading Civil War historian and he was fresh from speaking at Gettysburg earlier this month for the recent 150th anniversary. He theatrically told tales of Vermont men dying in the war or being wounded and returning home to small towns across the state.
And then, lastly, Richard Blanco. The inaugral poet.
For the last event of the day, Carly and I divided and conquered. She attended a 'writing suspense for young adult readers' workshop while I attended a reading by Blanco. Along with Galway Kinnel's presentation, this was my favorite of the day. Hearing Blanco's personal background and experiences mixed with his poems focusing on discovering his own American identity, ethnicity and sexuality was fascinating. And of course, his performance of the inaugural poem, 'One Today' was very exciting to witness in person. I've shared it in full here once before, but these opening stanzas are my favorite:
One sun rose on us today, kindled over our shores,
peeking over the Smokies, greeting the faces
of the Great Lakes, spreading a simple truth
across the Great Plains, then charging across the Rockies.
One light, waking up rooftops, under each one, a story
told by our silent gestures moving behind windows.
peeking over the Smokies, greeting the faces
of the Great Lakes, spreading a simple truth
across the Great Plains, then charging across the Rockies.
One light, waking up rooftops, under each one, a story
told by our silent gestures moving behind windows.
My face, your face, millions of faces in morning's mirrors,
each one yawning to life, crescendoing into our day:
pencil-yellow school buses, the rhythm of traffic lights,
fruit stands: apples, limes, and oranges arrayed like rainbows
begging our praise. Silver trucks heavy with oil or paper—
bricks or milk, teeming over highways alongside us,
on our way to clean tables, read ledgers, or save lives—
to teach geometry, or ring-up groceries as my mother did
for twenty years, so I could write this poem.
each one yawning to life, crescendoing into our day:
pencil-yellow school buses, the rhythm of traffic lights,
fruit stands: apples, limes, and oranges arrayed like rainbows
begging our praise. Silver trucks heavy with oil or paper—
bricks or milk, teeming over highways alongside us,
on our way to clean tables, read ledgers, or save lives—
to teach geometry, or ring-up groceries as my mother did
for twenty years, so I could write this poem.
As we departed Woodstock and headed back towards New Hampshire, we enjoyed a stop at 'Scotland by the Yard'. It was a wonderful large gift-shop that reminded both Carly and I of any and every gift shop in Scotland. We knew the products, the tartans, the kilts, the celtic crosses and jewellery. It was especially sweet (and nostalgic) to have this photo taken by a Vermont mother and daughter who were visiting Scotland by the Yard as the daughter is soon to set off on her own Junior-Year-Abroad in Scotland.
The celtic music playing throughout was beautiful and so so nostalgic. We spoke with the shop owner and enjoyed browsing.
And with a relaxed Saturday evening and Sunday including plenty of wilderness, lake, trees and reading, Carly departed and Monday arrived. It was wonderful experiencing Bookstock and exploring the summer beauty of Vermont and New Hampshire with her.
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