Featured poets from the anthology
Up From the Ashes, We Rise.
https://lvlitnm.org/
Followed by open mic
Edited by David Rogers. Cover image by Pola Lopez. Foreword by Elmo Baca. Las Vegas Lit Press 2023. Available from your favorite book shop or via amazon or from the publisher. Las Vegas Lit Press: https://lvlitnm.org email: hello@lvlitnm.org
article by Bill Nevins, Vozclara Poetry & Music Project
This poetry and prose anthology book was conceived in the wake of New Mexico's worst natural disaster in written history, a fire and flood, which devastated vast areas of San Miguel and Mora Counties in northeast New Mexico. While the Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon wildfire consumed more than three hundred thousand acres of forest land and some nine hundred structures, for many it also reduced to ashes a way of life which had lasted for hundreds of years, since the region was on the northern edge of the Spanish Empire in the Americas.
The title, "Up from the Ashes: We Rise," embodies both the deep sense of loss many are feeling in the aftermath of this tragedy, and an equally vital sense of resolute belief in our ability to rise again, as individuals and as a community. The works of nearly forty writers are offered to readers in this collection. Most, but not all, are personal reactions to and reflections on their experiences in the time of the fire. Some are expressions and explorations of challenging experiences, not fire- related.
Among the authors in this collection are Las Vegas NM Poet Laureate Kayt C. Peck, Carmen Baca, Kathamann, Scott Wiggerman, Deborah Coy, Bill Nevins (myself), and many others. Each piece is a treasure. Here is one selection:
"The Measure"
"Treasure is that which
remains when everything else
has burned to ashes."
--Sharon Vander Meer, p. 117
The purpose of this book is to serve as a well of sorrow and hope, filled by the writers and available to us all to drink deeply from its healing words and reflect on our own “Up from the Ashes” moments as we too rise again.
Highly recommended.