Writing the Land: Poetry from the Special Places of the Upper Valley
Monday, October 25, 2021 — The Upper Valley Land Trust (UVLT) is a partner in a new anthology of poetry to be released this month. “Land inspires art, music, literature, poetry,” says UVLT Programs Director, Alison Marchione. “Examining and expressing connections between people and the natural world is universal. We are pleased to participate in the Writing the Land project because it supports both poets and land conservation. It invites people into new aspects of place and stewardship through poetry.”
“In the last few years we have seen how both the outdoors and the arts have sustained people in times of hardship.” Said Marchione. “We wanted to open up the conservation lands we own to poets so that they could transform the outdoor experience through their art and we can share that through this anthology.”
The Upper Valley Land Trust will host a virtual poetry reading on November 3rd from 12-1pm to showcase the three poets who visited and wrote of Upper Valley lands. Hope Jordan, Christopher Locke, and Jessica Purdy wrote about Up on the Hill Conservation Area in Charlestown, True’s Ledges in Lebanon, and The Dismal at Pressey Brook in Hanover. Registration for this event is required and can be found at uvlt.org/calendar.
The Writing the Land: Northeast is being released October 31st. The Writing the Land Project is a collaboration between land trusts and artists to help raise awareness for the preservation of land, ecosystems, and biodiversity. A partnership between the environmental and arts communities, Writing the Land poets adopt conserved land, and write poems inspired by it. The poems, along with photos, maps, and other information about the land, are published in anthologies sold in support of land conservation. The lands featured in the Writing the Land anthology are several of the 28 properties that UVLT owns for long-term conservation stewardship.
The Anthology is for sale on UVLT’s website: uvlt.org/shop
“Writing the Land attempts to put poetry to work supporting the mission of land protection through land trusts.” Said Lis McLoughlin, Director of the Writing the Land project “I started WTL because as a poet and an activist it wasn’t enough for me to write poetry and hope the right people would trip over it. I want my poetry to help protect the land that inspires it from development, and because land trusts are excellent at land conservation, I decided to create anthologies that support their mission."
The first anthology: Writing the Land: Northeast is being released October 31, 2021. Consisting of 11 chapters, one for each land conservation entity, and 40 poets, this book is edited by Writing the Land director Lis McLoughlin (Northfield, MA), with a foreword by Tom Butler (Green Mountains of Vermont), and cover art by Martin Bridge (hilltowns of western Massachusetts), published by Paul Richmond, Human Error Publishing, a small poetry press in Wendell, Massachusetts.
This project has grown tremendously since its first year, and is now national. For 2022, 4 books are planned including one with a focus on Foodways and Social Justice. Over 50 land conservation partners are involved, with almost 150 poets from across the US, including Hawaii.