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I came across Lisa Bledsoe’s poetry collection on a list of recommended Appalachian reading.
And I’m very glad I did. Her verbal grounding in the mountains of North Carolina is deep, true and beautiful.
And this is the perfect time to read Bledsoe’s celebratory poems, these summer months. If you’re not already outside, this book will remind you to be outside—and, well, to be.
Sometimes there are hints of Emily Dickinson in Bledsoe’s lines, sprinkled with dashes and a touch breathless. And a word picture like “the mountains wreathed in leagues of silk” is vintage visual Dickinson.
And sometimes you’re reminded of the late Mary Oliver, whose ability to blend the mundane and the profound brought her many readers.
But Bledsoe is a fine poet in her own right. She’s fond of addressing the reader—You—and you can’t not pay attention. In “Song of the Spring Beauties,” she pays homage to the early wildflower:
“Seven years
it takes for each bloom to rise
from seed to rousing chorale,
ripened beauty
I went warm-wrapped with bucket and trowel
but gazing out, became rooted:
an antiphon in celebration of this
slow mastery and small wild praise
You and I need them here—all of them!—
feeding the psalm of the world”
The last line in this collection is one to carry with you, a gentle and reassuring gift:
“Take your time, this is a test. This is how you will begin again.”
Promise—wherever you’re sitting when you read these poems, you’ll be transported to a better place…to begin again.
Lisa Creech Bledsoe. ‘Appalachian Ground.’ 2019. 114 pp.
The story above first appeared in our July/August 2021 issue.
