celebrate a new poetry collection, Bird of a Thousand Eyes, by Janet Aalfs

On Tuesday, November 9th, @ 7:30 pm at the A.P.E. Gallery in Northampton (126 Main St.), one of my closest poetry girlfriends, Janet Aalfs, is inviting everyone to join her and Levellerspress (www.levellerspress.com) to celebrate the publication of her latest collection of poems, Bird of a Thousand Eyes.

While I won't be able to make it due to work demands - that night, I will be co-facilitating a P-PUA (Peck Parents United in Action) meeting - I encourage those who can to attend.

I had the privilege of writing a blurb for this collection:

Evocative. Profound. Meditative. Transcendental. Immediate terms I am using to describe this latest collection of poems, Bird of a Thousand Eyes, by the poet Janet Aalfs. From the very first poem, the poet shares her heightened awareness of experiences that we may tend to overlook, to ignore, or to take for granted: one’s daily connection with breath; complex connections with family; a symbiotic relationship with nature’s creatures; the impact of travel and landscapes on one’s self; the purpose of dreams; the necessity to live mindfully with those whom we encounter intentionally or accidentally among the living; and deep respect for those who now live on only in our memories. I look forward to re-reading this collection by Aalfs for it compels me - and will compel other readers - to “ask myself how/I live” (from “How” page 16). - María Luisa Arroyo, author of Gathering Words: Recogiendo Palabras

I know that I am looking forward to buying my own copy to re-read and to re-immerse myself in.