LAKE COUNTY — Lake County Poet Laureate Mary McMillan is looking forward to the task of representing Lake County”s writing communities. “I deeply appreciate the honor and I hope to live up to the other poets laureate.”
Departing poet laureate Sandra Wade introduced her successor at a reading held Sunday at the Lake County Arts Council”s Main Street Gallery. The Lake County Board of Supervisors will make an official appointment at an upcoming meeting.
McMillan is the fifth poet to serve as Lake County Poet Laureate. The tradition began with Jim Lyle and continued in turn with James BlueWolf, Carolyn Wing Greenlee and Sandra Wade. McMillan said she would continue traditions introduced by her predecessors including a monthly writer”s group that has been hosted by Wade on the first Thursday of the month at the Main Street Gallery in Lakeport.
“I”m working with Richard Martin on a radio show on KPFZ,” McMillan said, concerning a local public radio station that is expected to go on the air within upcoming weeks. McMillan also works with Wade and local writer Richard Schmidt to screen work for “Creative Expressions,” a publication of poems and “flash” fiction (700 words or less) that appears in the Record-Bee.
McMillan is a licensed marriage and family therapist and has lived in Lake County for three years.
Sunday”s reading included BlueWolf and Greenlee who were involved in reviewing work submitted by poet-laureate applicants.
“One of the things that impressed me was her courage,” Greenlee said, speaking of a poem by McMillan about her brother beating her mother. Greenlee lauded McMillan for being willing to be so vulnerable and added that even though that poem was written 20 years ago, there seemed to be no gap between it and other poems that were written more recently.
“I was impressed by her imagery and courage,” BlueWolf added.
The Lake County Poet Laureate encourages writing of poetry and prose and represents Lake County poetry at events outside of the county. Wade traveled extensively throughout the greater Bay Area.
Lyle, BlueWolf and Greenlee performed a number of recitations as a “Poetrio.”
“Poetrio was a great experience because our themes were similar in some respects but our styles were very different,” said BlueWolf.
For more information about the office of Lake County Poet Laureate, e-mail Mary McMillan at mtmcmillan@mac.com
Contact Cynthia Parkhill at cparkhill@clearlakeobserver.com.
What we See in the Recesses of the Park
Mary McMillan
a bed roll rumpled in bushes
a man standing alone
in low light
in a meadow
another man bending in the shadow of trees
pulling down
red-striped underpants
far away a man casting a long line
into lifeless pools of water
where circles fade in dusk
the last high light groping limbs
wanting to be down
to be down in the grass
wanting to be resting in the rough gray skin
of that pool
madly groping those high tops
of trees
a dim star in the still open
sky, the global weight
of the moon
a passenger jet flying between them
wing lights blinking
and when we lie down
we pray for nothing
except this wanting
